


School, Royalty and What Else Was It?

by Mary308



Category: The Legend of Zelda & Related Fandoms, The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker, The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, Alternate Universe - School, But I Change Names, Don't worry, F/M, I Don't Even Know How To Use These, Just a Draft I Guess, Link Had a Bad Childhood, Link's Not Mute In This One, Long summary, M/M, My First Fanfic, Please Don't Kill Me, School Goes All The Way From Kindergarten To College, Slow Burn, There's Going To Be More Than One Link, They're Fifteen At The Beginning!
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-28
Updated: 2019-02-15
Packaged: 2019-05-14 17:53:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 23,986
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14774360
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mary308/pseuds/Mary308
Summary: Hyrule Academia, the most renowned establishment in the whole kingdom, was known for the high difficulty of the entrance exam because of their odd and special education system in the pursuit of the best of the best, where not only did the students have to learn what is commonly taught, but they were divided into five small ‘realms’, each with their own ruler, better known as “champions”.Through the school year, all kind of contests are made as to define the dominant domain, which of course made everything seem very competitive. Even so, the five champions were very good friends. They were admired by everyone and most of them were very friendly, but at the same time, they were known for being a really tight-knit group and that it was impossible to enter it. Since the beginning, the five of them had always stuck together, and they weren’t planning on changing that number anytime soon. But this is what brings us to this story.





	1. Please Give A Good First Impression.

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! God I'm so awkward. I'm so very nervous.  
> To be honest this is the first actual fanfic I've written and want to post, specially because Tloz is my all-time favorite fandom. And Revalink is just... love it.  
> English is not actually my first language so if there's some really stupid errors, well then... you know.  
> This is not revised either! As if I had the fortune of having a beta reader lol.  
>   
> There's also a detail, this story mostly tells what Link knows, feels and sees, so that's why we don't have much of an insight of what's happening elsewhere, hahaha...  
> I think that's all, I hope you enjoy!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since it seemed so weird just the title without notes...  
> I started writing this as a way of relaxing myself from school and just life overall haha, so um... don't kill me for my grammar-  
> The first chapter is actually quite short... haha.  
> Enjoy!

Hyrule Academia, the most renowned establishment in the whole kingdom, it had the country’s name in it after all, was known for the high difficulty of the entrance exam because of their odd and special education system in the pursuit of the best of the best, where not only did the students have to learn what is commonly taught, but they were divided into five small ‘realms’, if you would, where every student had a role, be it either something as simple as a worker up to being the ruler, better known as “champions”, the title that is given to them to prove how they’re the best that “kingdom” has to offer.  
The groups were named after nature, but are also related to elements. The Waterfall kingdom, for example, was made up by students who were very kind and calm most of the time, but if provoked they could prove to be quite scary. Then there were the Volcano, Lightning, Tornado and lastly the Starlight kingdom.  
Every new student was observed closely in their first half of the year by the Champions and teachers to then be designated to a kingdom. Through the school year, all kind of contests are made as to define the dominant domain but also to improve or change the student’s ranking, which of course made everything seem very competitive. Inside and outside of the divisions.  
Even so, the five champions were very good friends, they had known each other since the very day they entered this prestigious school after all, which is to say, when they were young children, and now that they were older, the Champions were nearly inseparable, even if they had their friendly and competitive banter a lot of the time. They were admired by everyone and most of them were very friendly, but at the same time, they were known for being a really close group and impossible to enter it. Since the beginning, the five of them had always stuck together, and they weren’t planning on changing that number anytime soon. But this is what brings us to this story.

It was a new day and the sun was shining brightly in that fresh morning, annoyingly blinding to whoever was still sleeping, proven to be true when a blue-eyed blonde started shifting in his sleep.

“Five more minutes…” he whispered to the air, moving to the other side so the sun didn’t hit his face directly and he relaxed again. But that didn’t last long, since not even a minute later someone kicked the door open, effectively waking the blonde up, but at the same time almost giving him a heart attack. He turned only to see a girl with a small grin greet him, ticking him off.

“So you’re finally awake, Link! You need to get ready for today, it’s very important, so hurry and take a shower!” A girl with bright blonde hair up in a bun excitedly told the other. Her grin growing even more when she noticed just how annoyed he was.

“What’s your problem Tetra? You almost gave me a stroke here!” Link protested, glaring at the girl. But getting the covers off of his body, turning so now he was looking at her directly, his feet touching the floor.  
Tetra ‘tch’ed three times playfully, while making a ‘no’ motion with her hand.

“The problem is, my little cousin, that today you have your special entrance exam which you were so excitedly waiting for. And if you don’t hurry then you’ll miss it. You have…” and at this, she looked at the clock at the right side of the room, next to a bookshelf.

“Twenty minutes tops to take a shower, brush your teeth, eat your breakfast, blah blah. So I’d rush if I were you~!” And at this, she happily skipped to the door and closed it with a soft ‘click’, leaving the boy in the room in total despair, first, he was disbelieving, then angry and finally he was panicking.

“And get downstairs before your breakfast gets cold or I’ll be mad!” Tetra shouted, making Link snap out of his trance and rush to the bathroom to get ready. Luckily, his cousin Tetra lived close enough to where he has to go to make it in ten minutes or less, but he really didn’t want to be late if he hoped to get into the school plus college of his dreams.

After tidying himself up, he almost fell going down the stairs in his hurry.

“Why didn’t you wake me sooner, Tetra?!?” Link almost shouted when he saw her smug smile the moment he entered the kitchen, but he had to control himself. After all the years they’d lived together, he could almost call her his big sister, but all the love in the world couldn’t impede the rush of anger that coursed in him at that moment.

“Oh~ But I did! Just that by the third time you had gone back to sleep, I stopped trying until I noticed that you were probably late.” She snickered behind her hand, trying not to make fun of her little cousin.

Link groaned but took one look at the clock and decided that he was not wasting his time on this, not this day.

“Anyway, I’ll just eat this on the way, bye!” And so, he drank his hot milk and took two fruits that had been on top of the table, then turning, opening the door and shouting a final “wish me luck!” before he was gone.

Tetra just sighed, her relative reminded her of the time when she was his age, fifteen, and how her best friend just seemed to be so similar in some ways to Link. She was surprised by how much everything had changed since then, but her feelings had stayed the same. At that, she blushed while quickly dismissing her thoughts, looking to the dirty dishes and sighing again.

“I hope you enter, Link…” she whispered before starting to do the dishes.

Link was about to arrive at the huge and imposing building, but first, he dumped the remains of the fruits he had been eating. To say that he was nervous would be an understatement, he felt as if he was going to puke any moment now, but he tried to calm down and reminded himself that he didn’t have a moment to spare.  
He uncomfortably looked around and saw some students just walking around, they were all wearing some kind of pins in their clothing though, and that struck Link as odd as he didn’t know a lot about this school other than his parents had been students here and something about king and queens which they had told him before they… disappeared. His memory was fuzzy since it had been a long time ago, so that was all he could remember from their stories of this place.  
He decided that it wouldn’t hurt to ask one of them where the interviews were taking place, but then he saw some bush moving behind him and he couldn’t help his curiosity, so he went around it only to see a small red-haired girl hiding in the bush, and by the looks of it she seemed very nervous for some reason.

“Might as well, right?” he whispered to himself, slowly approaching the girl and crouching down beside her.

“Hey?” he looked at her, receiving a small squeak of surprise and a nervous but defeated look as an answer. “I was wondering if it wouldn’t be too much trouble to give me some directions…?” Link scratched his cheek with a little of embarrassment and a lot of awkwardness, looking at the floor beside the girl instead of her seemingly golden, or just very light brown, eyes.

She at first seemed shocked and whispered something to herself that he didn’t quite catch, but then she smiled softly but sweetly.

“Of course! Where do you need to go? Maybe if we’re lucky we need to go to the same place!” she said energetically, but still being careful of not talking too loud, he still didn’t understand why.

“You need to go somewhere?” Link paled slightly, thinking about how not even five minutes after he entered the building he had already bothered someone and messed up.

“Then it’s okay… I think I can find it alone.” He tried to not berate himself so hard at that moment. With some luck he wouldn’t be terribly late.

“Oh, no! It’s okay, don’t worry! I don’t think they’ll mind if I arrive a little bit later. So where is it that you need to go?” The girl questioned again, still with that soft smile on her face.

“If you say so…” Link sighed and looked at the girl’s eyes before continuing. “I need to get to the… interview for the new student’s room…” He said almost shyly, his worries getting to him.

The girl smiled brightly this time, and it somehow seemed to calm him a little. Almost like… Magic.

“What a coincidence, I have to go there too! Why don’t I show you the way instead of giving you directions? It’ll be faster that way!” Her eyes just seemed to have lit up suddenly, leaving him rather confused, but at least he had one problem less.

“Thanks, you really saved me…” Link trailed off, wanting to ask for her name but not knowing how.  
The girl blushed lightly before bringing her hand up to cover her mouth, which was in an ‘o’ shape.

“Where have my manners gone? I am so sorry. My name is Mipha Aqua, what’s yours?” She politely apologized and then she looked up anxiously, hoping that the boy she just met wasn’t angry with her. She really was a pure and kind-hearted soul.

“Ah no, you don’t have to be sorry. If anything, I have to for bothering you.” He over-politely apologized, and after some seconds in which he seemed to be debating, he answered her question. “And my name is Link… it is nice to meet you, Mipha.” He looked as if he had wanted to say something more, but chose to change it at the last second, which caused for Mipha to look at Link curiously before she was back to smiling.

“Well then, let’s get going! We wouldn’t want to arrive even later, right?” She giggled a bit as she cautiously moved with the bush until she could hide behind some trees, which got her on the receiving end of not only a few strange looks from her new ‘friend’.

“O…kay, I guess.” Link said to himself, following her from the clearer path, the one students were supposed to use.

Once they arrived at a long hallway which seemed pretty much deserted did Mipha stop hiding, finally relaxing.

“That was… Fun!” she said excitedly but softly at the same time, and no, Link did not know how she did that either.

“That was weird.” Link quickly objected, looking as the red-haired girl deflated slightly only to get excited again in less than a minute. “Why were you hiding anyway?” He asked, looking at Mipha dead serious.

She tried very hard not to burst out laughing, and it proved to be quite hard, but she managed somewhat.

“You’ll see.” Mipha told him with a mischievous glint in her eyes, causing for Link to shudder unexpectedly. Somehow he didn’t expect anything good out of it.  
Suddenly, Mipha stopped in front of a door, but since Link was a little bit distracted, he didn’t notice until she called out to him.

“Hey, Link…? You sure you want to miss this?” she teasingly said, still having that glint in her eyes and a smile that couldn’t be called anything other than ‘will bring you trouble’.

“Oh.” Suddenly his anxiousness came back full force and he would have started shaking had it not been for Mipha. At least he wasn’t alone, he thought foolishly.

“Wait a bit here, ‘kay? Everything will go fine, don’t worry!” She smiled reassuringly at him, momentarily forgetting her mischievous thoughts when seeing how shaken up the other was.

“Sure.” Great, now Link was getting clammed up. He seriously didn’t know how this would go now, where had his courage and confidence gone to?  
Mipha just giggled a bit, somehow reading Link’s thoughts before she opened the door and quickly closed it, leaving him alone to his worries.

 

But his train of thought was interrupted not long after that, he heard someone was complaining how Mipha had taken way too long, that they had a schedule, more important things to do, and Mipha just giggling. After that, it was just chaos, it could only be described as chaos. The first voice just got louder so he couldn’t hear Mipha giggling anymore, two new voices joined passionately the conversation, and a third one talked every so often. He was so distracted by what he could hear when suddenly a soft but imposing voice cut the chaos short he was completely out of it. He felt his stomach turning and he was sure he had started to sweat already. Maybe he could turn away and pretend this never happened? No, no, it was too late for that already and Mipha was waiting for him. What would everyone think of someone who couldn’t enter Hyrule Academia just because they were too scared of the interview? He absolutely couldn’t let that happen. In his trance, he didn’t notice how Mipha never came out again.

When everything was calm, the imposing voice spoke again.  
“Come in.” It said. Link was trying to prepare himself for everything that could happen and what they could ask of him, but nothing seemed to be enough. He counted to ten and then he finally opened the door.

Once he was finally inside the room, he couldn’t help but admire the ancient design it had, giving him the feeling of standing in those castles of the medieval age. It was different from everything he had seen before, which is why it caught his attention so easily.

He was snapped out of his thoughts with a gentle cough, causing him to turn to his front, looking at the six persons who were there too. He noticed that there were five thrones, all being used, a little higher up than he was, as if on the top of a really small staircase; from left to right, there was Mipha, then a burly guy with a big smile on his face, he also had… was that hair white or platinum blonde? And blue eyes, just like him!  
Next to him, in the center, was a beautiful blonde girl with green eyes who somehow gave him a very nostalgic feeling, but besides that, she also seemed to be very graceful.  
At her side, a tall girl with fiery red hair and a mischievous glint in her green eyes was sitting, and on the other corner there was a boy with slicked-back navy hair, his narrowed green eyes and the way he held himself just screamed arrogance and seeing as how he already was quite mad just by his presence, Link guessed the other boy wouldn’t be quite friendly.  
Even so, they all didn’t seem to be much older than him, they were probably his age too.

Then, the last person in the room had just stood up from a desk, even higher up than the thrones although not by much, and positioned themselves right behind the girl in the middle; looking very powerful and imposing was the young lady with white hair and fierce eyes when she leaned against that throne.

Link looked at Mipha totally flabbergasted, his eyes widening and his mouth hanging open, what was she doing on a throne? And why were they even thrones in here? What was all this about? Why were they all using a blue garment? A million questions ran through Link’s head at that moment and he didn’t have an answer for any of them.

Apparently, his confusion was very noticeable as Mipha giggled at the face he was making, the other red-haired girl in the room and the burly guy were barely containing their laughter, the blonde haired one was smiling at him and finally, the friendly one got even more upset than before. Excellent.

The young lady, noticing his distress, decided to help him out.

“I expected for you all to be more mature than that, seems like I was wrong.” She said, looking at the five that were seated on the thrones before turning to Link again. “My apologies, they are normally calmer. My name is Impa, and I am the director of this establishment, what is your name, young man?” Her tone was just as stoic as her stance, looking down at him with the power of authority, which did absolutely wonders on Link’s nerves.

“M-My name is Link, miss Impa. It is nice to meet you.” He cursed himself for stuttering at the beginning, he was normally courageous, where had that gone?

“Yes, it is a pleasure to meet you, Link. By your previous confused look, I would guess that you’re confused as to why these five are before you now, right?” She clearly knew how to get the conversation straight to the point, not wasting even a second to start explaining after receiving a nod as a response.

“Well, let me start from the basics. Hyrule Academia is known for not only being an excellent school and college but also for preparing youngsters to adapt to our system as a kingdom and direct possible leaders of the future generation to success, which is why it is so elite. Now, how exactly do we do that? Our students are to be divided into four ‘realms’ if you would, and each one has some role to play in their group. They could be assigned to be warriors, archers, healers, guardians, workers, among others, or the rulers, better known as champions, which are the ones who stand before you. They are the maximum authority out of the pupils and come only second to the teachers and me, the director. It is a tradition for them to attend the interviews and entrance of new students and a great chance for everyone else to get to know them in person before officially being in… Or not. Regardless, people have always admired them to the extent where we don’t have the heart to change this tradition anymore.” Impa finished and gave Link a minute to process everything she had just said, she knew it was a lot, but these were only the basics. Or what anyone would call common knowledge when talking about Hyrule Academia. “Now, I would very much appreciate it if everyone could introduce themselves. I believe that you can do that much, correct?” And then she turned to Mipha as if signaling that she was the one who had to start.

Luckily, she caught the signal and stood up gracefully, just like a princess.

“My name is Mipha Aqua, like I said before, and I am the ruler of the Waterfall Kingdom and our mascot is an elephant. It is a pleasure to officially meet you, Link.” And after giving a small curtsy, she sat down again. The blonde haired teen was going to respond, he was, until the white-haired, it was white and not platinum blonde, right? He needed to know; guy decided to abruptly stand up.

“The name’s Daruk Blaze, little guy! Nice to meetcha! I am the ruler of the Volcano Kingdom and our mascot is a salamander.” The burly guy, Daruk, said excitedly, and just as suddenly as he had stood up, he sat down again.

Once again, before he could even open his mouth, the next person was up. Maybe he should just wait for everyone to introduce themselves before talking. This time it was the girl who was somewhat familiar to him.

“My name is Zelda Hyrule, and as you could guess, I am the King’s daughter. I rule over the Starlight Kingdom and our mascot is a fairy. A pleasure to meet you, Link.” She finished looking directly at him as if she could read his thoughts, before smiling gently and sitting down. Somehow, he felt that her attitude was a bit odd, a little part of him insisted on how she was less formal and a lot friendlier, but a bit rude sometimes. He quickly dispelled his thoughts when the tanned and fit girl stood up.

“My name is Urbosa Firebolt, it’s always nice to meet someone new. My Kingdom’s name is Lightning and our mascot is a camel.” She spoke with pride in her tone when mentioning her reign, and gave him a smirk before sitting down.

He was already expecting for the blue-haired boy to stand up, however, he could have sworn to have heard; “To not even know the basics and making me, the great Revali, introduce myself? The nerve. Must I really do this?”, but after receiving a glare from not only Impa but Urbosa and Zelda too, he stood up, although making it seem as it was hard for him to do it, and when he was finally standing, he adopted a cocky pose before starting to speak louder.

“Revali Zephyr. Tornado Kingdom. Bird.” And after rolling his eyes dramatically, he sat down, receiving glares from everyone in the room, intensity varying.  
Link couldn’t help but think how much of a jerk he was, and he had only known him for five minutes! At least the others had been polite enough to be kind to him.

When he deemed that enough time had passed (a few seconds), and they were waiting for him, he finally opened his mouth.

“It is a great honor to meet you all, Champions of Hyrule Academia, and also Princess of Hyrule.” Link bowed to them all before he slowly stood up straight again.

“So now that is done and over with, let’s start. First, we’ll ask you some questions. Second, you will be given a test for your knowledge. And finally, there is going to be a test that will measure your wits and strength, after all that is done, we have a week to decide whether or not you are entering, given that a lot of youngsters apply to this establishment, so we are very strict. I would recommend being prepared.” Impa took the control of the conversation once again, making sure to explain what was coming briefly but clearly.

Link gulped but then nodded courageously, he needed to calm himself or else he would fail, he had waited for so long and the opportunity was finally here, he could not allow that to happen.


	2. Questions, Nervousness and Puzzles Part I

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Impa does the questioning, she shows that even she has a heart and then a knowledge test.  
> Of course, with the Champions making random appearances.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heyyyy, it's-a me, Mary!  
> And I'm coming back with a new chapter!  
> Since I thought that having the three tests in a single chapter might be too long, I cut it off. Sorry if the chapter's too short now...  
> I'll always try and have the next chapter done before posting!  
> Also, thank you for all the kudos, comments and bookmarks! It really motivates me!  
> Hope you enjoy!

“Let us begin. I will be asking the questions, and the champions here will be able to ask one each when we finish.” Impa got down to his floor, even so, she was still taller than him.

His growth spurt was probably just late, that was all. (Or that is what he forced himself to believe).

Then, she started circling him, possibly wanting to observe him better from all angles, but that was making him uncomfortable, you know? Not like he had a choice in the matter though.

“So, what reason brings you here?” She asked, getting the most obvious question out of the way first.

Link cleared his throat before speaking.

“Well… my parents assisted here when they were my age and here it was where they got together… so that’s why I got to know Hyrule Academia, and I started to admire it when they told me their experiences when I was only… a little baby… Since then, one of my biggest wishes has been to enter.” When Link started reminiscing about his parents, he suddenly got quieter and quieter, until he was only mumbling.

Luckily, since Impa was very close, she could hear him clearly, unluckily for the champions, they didn’t have that privilege so they could only fill up with their imagination those blank spaces between sentences that they didn’t hear.

“Hm. Understandable. Moving on, are you more proficient at physical activities or intellectual ones?”

She stopped at his right side, but the intensity of her gaze never let up, maybe she was waiting for the sign of a possible lie.

“I would say that while I am not exactly bad at intellectual activities, I tend to rush into things without thinking beforehand…” Link laughed sheepishly at that, his voice this time louder, allowing for everyone in the room to hear him.

“Oh yes, I have seen that a lot of times before, nothing some well-taught lessons can’t fix.” She said, stressing the word lot while looking pointedly at two of the Champions above them before turning to look at him like before.

“Do you prefer teamwork or working alone?” Impa asked something else this time, while most would relate it to fighting, it could also be applied to something as simple as some work for school that could be done in a group or not.

“Hm…” Link deliberately took a moment to figure out what was the closest answer to correct he could give while still being honest.

“While I have nothing against teamwork, I usually end up doing things on my own for some reason or another.” Probably because no one ever wants to do things with me except for Tetra.

That was going through his head but it was left unsaid.

As if sensing that, Impa glanced pointedly at Link’s eyes before sighing. If he chose to answer vaguely, then so be it.

It was not like she could force him be more specific, or she could but didn’t really have the heart to. She didn’t want to make him more uncomfortable after all.

“And finally, do you consider yourself skilled in battle?”

Link’s stance relaxed at knowing that this was the last question but tensed up again not shortly after when he noticed all eyes were on him, waiting for his response.

“I don’t have a lot of experience, but I know how to use a sword.”

He said calmly, not at all like how he was feeling inside, absolutely horrible, as if everything was in chaos and ready to puke. Why did he ever think that this was a good idea?

Impa, somehow noticing his inner disturbance, looked at the Champions as if she was daring them to ask the poor boy something, she may be a tyrant, but she also had a heart.

Sighing, she looked back at the boy who was just about to start fidgeting and cleared her throat.

“That will be all, thank you for your time and honesty. Now, if you would accompany me to the room next door for the second test?”

Impa kept a stoic expression as to not give the blonde boy any false hopes, and after signaling for him to follow her, she started walking to the room next door.

It was very similar to the one he had just been in, Link noticed. But the scheme was minimally changed, or the colors were flipped.

Frankly, he didn’t know since he had been too nervous to really notice every little detail, so it wasn’t totally his fault.

“You will have an hour and a half to finish this, so do not concern yourself with running out of time. The test is very basic, containing general knowledge for someone your age and some subjects which are taught here, although there are some trick questions here and there, so please do concentrate and… good luck.” Impa finished and then left the room, going back to where the champions were.

Luckily that room was soundproof so he couldn’t really hear if chaos ensued or not after he left.

The test wasn’t actually that hard for Link, he still had some minutes to spare after double checking his answers.

He never was an over the top student but he wasn’t bad at all, Tetra had made sure of that, so the test was… mildly challenging at most, Impa hadn’t lied.

He spent quite some time rolling the pencil he was given on the desk, not knowing what else to do since he clearly did not want to think about the interrogation he was subjected to earlier that day and make himself unnerved again.

And one thing would make way only to another; him failing the only chance he would ever have, Tetra’s disappointed and pitying gaze, his parent’s tales never to be seen, more years of his previous classmates… He seriously did not want to go there.

He came here for a change, acceptance, happiness, friends, discoveries, new memories.

That was the past, this was now.

Once the time was over, Impa came without even a minute of tardiness and took the test and pencil with her. Link, having been left alone in the room without any indications, didn’t really know what to do, so he just… waited, and then waited some more.

Suddenly, the door was slammed open by Urbosa, making the blonde jump slightly by the surprise, effectively dissipating the sleepiness that had been slowly taking hold of him.

“H-Hey.” Link said, his tone wavering slightly, noticed by the girl which could be seen in the way she smirked, but didn’t say anything because of the voices that could be heard from behind her.

“This is kinda fun!” He recognized that voice as Mipha’s. Why would she find something like this fun?

“I know, right? It has been a year already!” Someone exclaimed excitedly, judging by the voice, how Urbosa was right in front of him and that Mipha had just talked, it was probably Zelda.

“I like the little guy, he has got a spark! I’m sure he will pass.” Daruk exclaimed excitedly.

Hearing someone expecting something good from him made him really happy and nervous but he was trying to ignore that last part.

“Let’s just get this over with already, there’s tons of people who have come today. What a bother.” Revali groaned. Why did he have to be so unpleasant? If he managed to enter, he would be in the top of his list of ‘people to avoid’.

“Don’t get all your feathers ruffled, birdie. It’s not their fault that a lot of people have wanted to take the entrance test. It’s also part of a Champion’s duty, or do you want to step down from your throne?” Urbosa said mockingly.

Revali glared at her but stayed silent.

Now they were all standing in the doorframe and it seemed kind of uncomfortable. Link was just staring at them all and wondering what they were supposed to do when one of them, Zelda, walked forward and adopted a serious stance.

“We are here to take you to the place where your last test is to be held, just follow us.”

Then, she gracefully turned and started walking. The others moving so she could come out of the room and then started walking beside her.

Link didn’t take long to follow their lead, but that didn’t mean that he didn’t feel kind of awkward just being behind a group of five people who seemed to know each other very well.

He tried not to listen to their whispering, but it was kind of hard when it was the only sound in the hallway apart from their footsteps.

He could only hear part of their sentences though, something like “go talk to him!” and “yeah, I was with him before!”

To be honest, he felt quite embarrassed that they were very clearly talking about him when he was right there, but he tried distracting himself with thoughts related to his last test.

Hey, at least after this everything will be over, right? If he didn’t manage to enter everyone would make fun of him though… no, no! He couldn’t be so pessimistic before it’s over! Anything could make him get a higher chance in being accepted, but a lower chance as well.

Getting out of his head, it seemed like they had already arrived at their destination, given how everyone just suddenly stopped and turned.

They were all quite serious, but he could see the twinkle in Mipha’s eyes, almost as if she was wishing him luck. She was quite kind for someone of her status.

“This is where the last test will take place, once you enter you’ll be able to see all the weaponry we have available for you to use, feel free to take whatever you wish. You’ll have to wait for the signal to start though. Everything else will be explained once you’re inside.”

Zelda said, as if she was reading from a memorized script, and then started once again.

“It is time for us to leave, the best of luck to you.” And signaling to the others, they all left, to where? He didn’t know.

Link took some deep breaths to calm himself down and opened the door.


	3. Questions, Nervousness and Puzzles Part II

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heeeey, it's me again! I'm sorry for such a late update, but I've been really busy... I don't plan on giving up though!  
> Thanks for every kudos, comment and bookmark! I really appreciate it, and it motivates me to keep going!  
> Next chapter shouldn't take so long, as it's gonna be shorter than this one... still, I already have written half of it! I think haha...  
> I really hope you like this chapter and I suck at writing battle scenes so sorry for that! :)  
> If you have any kind of idea you'd like me to add, please do tell me!  
> Aaaaand that's all, enjoy!

To say that he was amazed by all the weapons inside would be an understatement, and here he thought that the ones in the weaponry shop were a lot.

He looked around for a sword and a shield which would fit him properly, none of them were much too appealing to him though… that is, until he saw one which was hidden in the corner, it was kind of rusty, but it was pretty similar to the one he used to train with when he had been younger, just bigger.

He practiced some swings and blocking imaginary enemies, and after some minutes, he deemed his skills to be at least passable. Seemed like body memory didn’t fail him after all.

He then saw some rods right next to the big door at the end of the room and wondered which one he ought to take.

Thunder, blizzard or meteor? And was that… a leaf? Link found himself really confused.

He didn’t have a long time to think about it though, because suddenly a voice started booming through a speaker on the ceiling.

“To those who wish to test their value, come forward.” Said an ominous voice. Link found it between cheesy and intimidating, it was too weird of a feeling to explain.

He opened the door and found himself in the middle of a forest.  
“Now this is definitely strange. What’s going on?” The blonde looked to his sides only to find more forest, there wasn’t anything else in sight!

He walked some more, wary of something suddenly popping out, but nothing happened.

“What do I even have to do?” He was wondering whether it would be a good idea to climb a tree when that same voice from before spoke.

“Your mission here is to find every hidden emblem in this place. There is a total of four, and you have three hours to do this. Do not waste any time, for it will be way too short in the end, and don’t forget to be careful, who knows what this forest could hold.”

The strange voice spoke formally but robotically, almost as if they were reading off from a script.

He could already feel the tension.

In the end, he climbed down and went north.

After some time of walking, he saw a very strange machine, it had a lot of legs, maybe six or eight? And a single ‘eye’ in its head, which was moving from side to side.

It seemed antique, but at the same time dangerous, he chose to hide behind a tree, keep quiet and wait until it disappeared as it went between the trees.

“That sure was strange...” He kept on walking until he found something that seemed like a shrine which had shining orange lights, and a pool around it. Maybe this was one of the places that he was supposed to go to?

After successfully jumping the pool of water he saw the entrance.

Its door was already open, so he just went in. But suddenly the floor under him began to shake and descend.

Link almost lost his balance but he managed to stay put until he was in another place entirely.

The design this place had reminded him of that… robot he saw earlier, and the shrine he had been in just moments before.

Leaving the platform, he instantly heard a voice similar to the one that spoke to him at the beginning.

“To the one who sets foot in this shrine… I am Owan Namut. This is part of the four trials, the water level. If you wish to advance you must solve the puzzles located here and defeat any enemy you find. Good luck.”

What happened next, Link didn’t quite know how to explain. It was a mess of swimming, monsters, and slippery floors.

Once he had finally found his way to the end of the shrine, there was a pedestal with a blue emblem in it.

Link could swear he heard Mipha’s voice when he took it.

“Congratulations! Not many can go through this shrine nor do they get this far, good job!” Maybe it had been recorded as a reward? He left the elephant’s symbol in his pocket.

When he came back out to the wild, he went northeast. There appeared stronger monsters the more he walked. Even finding a robot similar to the one that he had found before, only that this one was flying… strange.

Link saw what would be his second shrine the moment he almost stepped into lava, or what he thought was lava.

They wouldn’t have something so dangerous here… right?

He chose to believe in that lie if only to not start thinking of all the ways those robots could’ve killed him.

Being careful of not even getting near the lava, he went inside the shrine, but it would be for naught as the inside of it was full of the dangerous magma.

“You’ve got to be kidding me…” Link said, exasperated.

But before he could get moving, an ominous voice spoke “To the one who sets foot in this shrine, I am Dah Mael. This is one of the shrines corresponding to the final test, the fire level. Go now, youngster, and good luck.”

“Well, let’s just get going.” He took a determined stance and advanced.

What happened next was definitely a risky experience, he had the ever-present thought of tripping and falling to his death.

When he finally arrived at the pedestal and took the emblem, Link sighed in relief.

“Good job! Now you’re one shrine closer to finishing this trial; oh! And remember to take the emblem with you!” Daruk’s voice came through the token, much like Mipha’s had done before.

He pocketed it and appeared once more out in the wild.

“What’s with all this magical feeling they’re going for, anyway? How do they even do it?” Link started questioning all this nonsense that he had been in for like…

“WAIT! How much time have I been doing this for? They did tell me I only had three hours, how will I know when it’s close to over? What if I only have five minutes left? Agh!!”

Link, frustrated, started messing with his hair. Then, he looked at the sky to shout some more but instead saw gigantic numbers which left him with his mouth hanging open.

“Don’t they think they’re kind of overdoing it…?” He sighed, already tired with everything that had happened in only an hour and a half. “Ah, whatever. I have two shrines to go and only an hour and a half, gotta go!” He started running diagonally, going through trees as swift as a deer.

And no, he was not trying to be narcissistic, like the definition of the word he met only hours before, he actually had one running beside him, possibly trying to run away.

He eventually reached another shrine, it had sand around it and instead of trees, there were palms here.  
“Desert-like much? At least it’s not as weird as having possibly lava, just what kind of person-” He got cut off from his probably long rant when out of nowhere there were some sparks of electricity in the sand.

“Oh, this can’t be real. What’s with them and being overly dangerous? At least Mipha’s was only water and I really thank her for that!”

He started unconsciously counting the timing of the sparks to not end up like a fried Cucco from trying to get past the sand, while he was, of course, still thinking about how dangerous this whole school was and how was this supposed to be the entrance test when you could end up at the hospital from nearly everything in that place.

After a minute of regretting his life choices and trying to remember why he was here in the first place, he finally entered the shrine. Whatever was in there would probably have a lot to do with electricity and shocks.

“To you who sets foot in this shrine, my name is Daka Taag. You are right now in the thunder level, one of the shrines of the final test. Be careful, for this one is not easy. Your reward will be placed for you at the end of the path.” And again, a strange, ominous voice could be heard from everywhere but nowhere at the same time.

Link had never been more grateful for a piece of advice, because first steps in and a shock arrow was already whizzing by him, landing just where he had been a second before.  
In the end, he was totally exhausted after an intense running through more than half of the dungeon and battling the monsters that were blocking his path.

If he had still been as sensitive as when he was just a little kid, he definitely would have cried when he saw the pedestal with the emblem on top of it.

“Hey! You’re surprising even me, Urbosa, here! And that’s not an easy feat! Congratulations, you’re one shrine shorter from victory now.” Still, Link couldn’t help but smile at the motivational message that one of the Champions had left.

After magically transporting outside and checking that he had little less than an hour left, he decided to walk in the only direction he hadn’t yet, northeast. But since he guessed that he was already east, he just went north.

Everything was going smoothly, that is until he encountered another one of those strange machines, but this time he was spotted. The first thing he noticed was how it changed color from blue to orange. Then a laser appeared, and it was pointed at him. After that, it started to beep loudly and faster with each second that passed.

All that happened in a matter of seconds, and it was at that moment that Link knew, it was fight or flee. He felt more inclined to the latter, so when the beeping got louder he moved behind the closest tree and clinging to it for dear life.  
He could feel the… strange technological device getting closer to him, just beside in fact, but since they were on opposite sides, and the other only had a single ‘eye’, it could not see him. Once the beeping had stopped, he got down and started crawling to some other trees near him, praying to the goddesses above for it to not see him again.

After a little disorientation because of that incident, Link got back on track and no major events occurred, until reaching the shrine that is.

“Strangely enough, this one seems normal? Just ground around it, no thunder, water, lava? Well, isn’t that just convenient? Even more so with the little time I have left.” Link took slow steps towards the entrance, suspicious of how it didn’t have anything outside.

What he didn’t know neither did he expect was for him to enter and have a single block of stone in from of him with a treasure chest, a rotating tower and everything else was just nothing at all. It seemed like a big fall… ouch. Link shivered when he imagined himself falling all the way down and possibly breaking something more than just a leg or arm.

“To the courageous one who sets foot in this shrine, this is the wind level. It was made by me, Kaya Ruug. It is quite simple, turn on all the switches and you will finish. You are provided a paraglider in that chest, after you collect it, the mechanism is going to activate. Be careful not to fall, as it is not a fate you wish to meet.”

This time Link had a grim expression. “Maybe this will take more time than I had first thought.”  
After opening the chest and taking out the paraglider, not without his little pose, of course, he felt strong winds starting. After some seconds, it wasn’t just wind, they were tornadoes.

“W-Wait, tornadoes? T-That can’t be true, right?” He laughed awkwardly at his denial.  
“Do they really want me to go into tornadoes, not fall, land in different places of that tower and hit switches, go back to those crazy winds which are definitely not what I called them before and land on top to get that last emblem? And they want people to make it out… alive?”

While he started rambling, he saw some of the so-called switches that they had told him about, and after calming down enough so he could think clearly, he started making a strategy so he could reach them all in the fastest way possible. Or well, that’s what he wanted to do. Not like it really worked out like he wanted it to, but hey, at least he did it, right? Even if he didn’t feel his arms anymore.

“Huh, someone actually made it. Congrats on clearing the great Revali’s challenge, now take what you need and go away, I’ve got more things to do.” Link felt himself raising a brow at this… not quite satisfactory message. He sighed and pocketed this emblem too, feeling his body finally relax after what he could only call a rollercoaster of danger.

After getting outside, he looked to the sky and saw that he only had ten minutes left. Suddenly, a glowing arrow pointed straight down to the center of the place.  
“What? Do I have to go there in less than ten minutes? How am I supposed to do that if I’m so tired already…? Anyway, better start running.” He did run for some time, but he quickly got worn out. Even so, as he was not one to give up so easily, he kept at it.

After five minutes of intense running and Link feeling like he didn’t get any closer to the center, he could see that the emblems in his pocket were shining.

So, curious about it, he took each one of them out carefully, while slowing his running to a light jog. Once he had them all in his hands, he was surprised to see that instead of just shining randomly, it was more like they were pulsating in-sync. First, they turned blue, then red, yellow, green and finally white. It definitely was strange, how they seemed to be reacting to something, that was what Link was thinking when they stopped glowing.

Preparing himself to start running again, he felt one of his boots kick something made of glass and looking closely, it was kind of like a bottle which had some green liquid inside.  
After swinging it a little and against his better judgment, he chose to drink some of it, if everything before this hadn’t ended him, why would this strange liquid do it? Even if green was associated with venom sometimes.

“They wouldn’t give me venom, right? Or… would they? No. I don’t think so. But what else could this be? And why am I questioning this after drinking it? Anyway, what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, I guess?” After that little lapse, Link started to run again, feeling completely renovated, and that was how he discovered that those sayings weren’t just things that old people liked to mention.

Link looked up, searching for the arrow that was supposed to guide him, only for it to be almost directly on top of him. He had finally arrived! He was about to celebrate when he also noticed the clock by the arrow, which showed him that he had little to no time left.

Making haste, he went and picked up a white fairy emblem, and it was at that moment that the clock stopped ticking.  
“Very well done! Not many students can clear this extremely harsh trial. Now, if you would please leave your weapons in the room you took them from? Someone will be waiting for you outside.” And that was… Princess Zelda? So, in the end, every single badge had a message. That was actually quite nice from them… Or well, most of them.

His thoughts were interrupted when suddenly, the ground lit up and a path showed itself. Link followed it until finding himself in front of the door he had initially used.

Opening it, he saw the very same weapons that had surprised him before and going to the corner where the items had been hidden, which now had an obvious empty space he placed the sword, and next to it, the shield.


	4. Wait, Worry And a Well-wisher

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sooooooo sorry for taking so long :(  
> I've just been very busy with... life I guess.  
> I hope this chapter is enjoyable though! Comments and kudos are appreciated haha.  
> The next chapter really shouldn't take this long omg

Link relaxed and sighed, finally being able to take those deep breaths that he so desperately needed. “That was so stressful… I’m glad it’s over.”  
A single knock in the door and a cheerful “excuse me” was what brought him out of his head. He saw a happy redhead entering the room and it took him some seconds to recognize that it was Mipha the one who had entered the room.

Mipha’s eyes were shining and she had a big smile on her face. “Link!! You were so amazing back there! And… Wait, now is not the time to be celebrating, I have to take you somewhere! Follow me, please.” She started off very excited but her tone suddenly changed to one more regal-like. Then, leaving the room, she started walking.

Link, not quite understanding what had just happened, was left behind for a moment, but he quickly caught up with the red-haired girl who also was her ’friend’.  
“Hey, Mipha? What was that sudden change? It really surprised me…” He finished laughing awkwardly.

”Oh, I’m sorry about that, but since I am a student, and most importantly a Champion, there is a role I have to accomplish, and that is leaving a good image of our academy to ‘outsiders’.” She did air quotes at the end of her sentence, also laughing awkwardly at the strange situation they found them in.

“Even though I wasn’t supposed to be the one to come and pick you up, I insisted. Why? You ask, well… That’s just because you inspired me!” She imitated Link’s voice and ended up with a big smile, but then started whispering while looking off to the side. “And well, there was an important matter they had to attend to, I suppose?”

“Y-You’re exaggerating, I just tried my best, I guess?” Link felt his face get a little bit hot because of Mipha’s flattery.  
“Not at all! This trial is extremely hard, even for us! Anyway, we have arrived.” She looked behind her only to feel a déjà vu, watching how that boy who had been so relaxed until now got nervous all of a sudden. “Hey, it’s okay. You will definitely pass, I believe in you! And remember that now is not even when the results are announced, it’s still a week away dummy.” She tried to cheer him up, even using the so-called ‘Mipha’s Grace’, rumored to be able to help even those whose situation was dire.

“Y-Yeah… You’re right! There’s still hope for me after all. Now, I have to do this. I did the best I could, I can’t be regretting it now.” Link felt much better after Mipha’s little speech, she really was a sweet person, wasn’t she? He looked at her and gave a nod, she gave a smile and entered first.

He followed close behind and saw all the Champions and Impa in front of him. This room was… normal, how strange. There were three sofas and a desk. The two of them who had some kind of royal design were facing each other and the third one, a smaller and simpler one, was facing what he could guess was Impa’s desk.

”Please, take a sit.” Impa offered, taking her place behind the wooden escritoire as the five ‘royals’ sat down on the fancy sofas.  
”Thank you.” Link said, taking his seat in the only one which wasn’t taken.  
“Let’s get straight to the point, shall we? We still have more applicants to evaluate, so we need to make this fast. In a week, the results will be put on a poster outside our school, so please come when those are released. After that, we will personally give a review of the trials and the results for the ones who passed, taking into account their strong and weak points so we can start working based on that. After all, Hyrule Academia is the most prestigious establishment, it would be no good if a student of ours wasn’t at least distinguished in something. We aim for perfection. Also, do not be surprised if there is some extremely detailed information, we could see and hear everything that was happening in there at the last trial. Now go, there’s a candidate which has to start the third trial and another has to do the first. As you can see we are very busy, thanks for your application and have a good day.”

Link heard the last part like in slow motion, how come they would’ve seen and heard everything that was happening inside if they were taking other student’s tests? Were they robots? Or wait, aliens?!? No, no; Link told himself, must be something else. But that would also mean that they had heard everything, right? He hoped he hadn’t said way too many embarrassing things. And Impa just… said everything right away, no intervention from the Champions or anything, he was amazed.

Everyone in the room was looking at Link, waiting for him to stand up, but he seemed to be in his own little world. Mipha started whispering his name until she finally got tired and spoke normally.  
At this, Link was startled and so jumped a little in the seat, but then his face reddened when he saw that everyone was waiting for him.

“I-I’m so sorry! I’ll go now.” He looked straight at the floor and practically ran out of the room.  
Mipha quickly followed him out and stopped him by placing her hand on his shoulder. Suddenly he felt a spark of electricity running through him, making him see a fuzzy image of a red blur next to a mostly blue one in… an elephant? Link shook his head to get it out of his head only to see that Mipha was spaced out too. He now had a little headache though.

When he moved to touch his forehead, Mipha seemed to snap out of it and acted as if nothing had happened.

“Hey Link, what’s the big hurry? We are not going to eat you here, and on that note, why don’t you come here in… five days, same time? I want to give you a tour, you know, to get yourself used to the environment.” She winked at that last part, but then her hands went to her mouth in a surprised stance. “Oh, but if you’re not busy of course!”

“I-I don’t think I have anything to do that day in particular but… are you sure? Don’t you have important Champion duties to do, or wouldn’t it be strange if everyone saw you taking an outsider around the school? And I’m not even sure I’m going to pass yet, how can you be so sure about it?” Link questioned, his worries now getting to him.

“I can just feel it, you know? Even Zelda said so, there’s something familiar about you… And I’m sure everyone was impressed by your performance, I was!” Mipha tried to calm down the boy next to her, she didn’t know just what was it that made her interested in Link, but she thought that the others felt it too, or well, maybe?

Link checked the time on a conveniently placed clock in the wall, and that was when he noticed that he should be going back any moment now.  
”Oh no! I have to go now Mipha, it was a pleasure to meet you but if I don’t go my cousin will kill me! Bye!” And he took off running, but he managed to hear the soft ”Remember, in five days!” coming from his new friend, which left him quite happy.

He managed to reach his house in record time, not for the first time fearing Tetra’s anger at him arriving late. But what surprised him was that she didn’t even open the door neither was she behind it with her disapproving face. In fact, if he wasn’t hearing wrong there were some sounds coming from the living room, maybe she was there?

“Hey Tetra! I’m… ho…me? I-I’m going upstairs.” Link could feel his face get hotter by the scene he just saw. He quickly went to his room and threw himself on the bed.  
“Geez, at least they could do those things, I don’t know, in her room? My now not so pure eyes…” Link sighed and pressed his face on the pillow. But what was it that he saw? Nothing more and nothing less than a full make-out session between Tetra and her boyfriend Gale Waker, In. The. Middle. Of. The. Room.

“I still think that’s a weird name… But at least she thinks it’s cool. He’s fun to be with though, he always buys me treats so I’ll let this one pass.” He stood up suddenly, remembering that he still had to shower, and he got up to do so.

But surprise surprise! Tetra and Gale were waiting for him outside of his room, the former with an expression of regret and the latter just smiling. But Tetra jabbed him in the side so he could start talking.  
“Sorry Link, it’s just that we didn’t know you were home. Forgive us? I’ll buy you ice cream!” Gale tried but received a glare from his girlfriend, which made Link actually laugh.  
“It’s okay, I forgive you. But I still want that ice cream though!”  
Gale smiled and Tetra sighed exasperatedly.  
”Anyway, you sure took your sweet time, huh?” She smiled widely at Link.  
“Y-Yeah, it was very long” He laughed awkwardly. “In fact, I was just going to take a shower now, so if you’ll excuse me…” Link started moving slowly towards the bathroom.  
“You stop right the- huh? What is it? I’m trying to talk to Link here.” Tetra looked at her boyfriend with a raised brow.  
”Just let it go Tetra, why not pay back the favor? You don’t want him going around the house all sweaty either, do you?” Gale smiled calmly.  
She just ‘tch’ed and went downstairs, her boyfriend giving Link a thumbs up before following behind her.  
Now alone, he went straight to the bathroom, thanking the goddesses above and Gale that he was saved from Tetra’s wrath.  
After a relaxing shower, he went downstairs to get something to eat.

“Tetra, I’m starving!” Link yelled, dragging out his cousin’s name.  
“I had already guessed so, your plate is on the table.” She told him, washing the dishes from before while Gale was drying them, he sure was a lot of help sometimes, other times… Not so much.

“Thank you for the meal, that was delicious! Now, ice cream!” He began chanting ice cream like a little kid, smiling a little.  
“Yes, yes. Just let me finish what we’re doing first, okay? It won’t take long.” Tetra began to think how much she sounded like a mother instead of a cousin saying that kind of things.  
“Okay… But hurry up!” Link had excitedly run out of the house already, waiting for them outside the window, knocking when he thought they weren’t paying attention just to give them a lil’ scare, y’know?

He saw how Tetra jumped straight into Gale, and because he was not standing up correctly, they both fell. Which of course made Link laugh a lot. But it stopped abruptly when he looked inside only for his cousin to be looking straight at him with such a glare that if they could kill, he would be dead a hundred times and one more.  
Link looked off to the side and pretended to be innocent, starting to hum a song and hopping until he got to the street.

He heard the door being kicked open, so he turned around, fearful of Tetra being there. And as if she was reading his thoughts, she was there, but she also was getting closer to her little cousin, slowly, step by step.

Link could feel his lifespan shortening with every step Tetra took, only for Gale to come running to Link before his girlfriend could probably damage in some way his little relative, and of course, calming Tetra down, which strangely didn’t take as long as it normally did.  
She sighed and ended up only telling Link to not do that again.

“Y-You are my savior, G-Gale. I love you so much right now.” Link told the other male after giving him a hug of gratitude.  
“It’s okay Link, don’t worry. Always ready to help. Anyway, where do you want to go to eat ice cream?” He patted his (not said but everyone knows) ‘adopted’ little cousin’s back and then smiled.  
“Anywhere is fine!” Link said, which Tetra responded to “Then why not the one that is like two blocks away?”, being received with a nod and a yell of excitement.

Once they arrived and ordered their ice creams, Link could see a group of ‘very’ familiar people coming to the same ice cream parlor that they were in.

Only the thought of them seeing him made him panic, which is why he took Tetra’s and Gale’s sleeves, bringing them closer and whispered “L-Let’s leave.” Receiving confused glances from both of the adults, as to which he said desperately “Please, now.”, starting to tremble in fear.

Tetra nodded, looking to where Link had been watching and suddenly understanding, while Gale took her girlfriend’s and Link’s ice cream in his hands, which were not finished yet.  
She hugged him sideways, leaving from the other entrance, knowing that if ‘they’ saw Link, it would bring nothing but problems to him, while Gale was on his other side.  
After rounding a corner so that they could make their way home without passing in front of the parlor, Link spoke.  
“I’m sorry.”  
Tetra looked at him worriedly and gave Gale a glance.

“It’s okay, we understand. And it’s not your fault that they went to the same place that we did. We can eat the rest of the ice cream at home, ok?” She tried to cheer him up, being reminded of all the times she had to see how Link would come back home after an encounter with his… classmates.  
“The sky sure is beautiful today…” Gale said looking off to the horizon, as if deep in thought.  
“W-What’s with that? It has nothing to do with anything we have talked about!” Tetra questioned, totally flabbergasted by her boyfriend’s strangeness.  
“We weren’t? Really? I could have sworn we were though…” He laughed sheepishly.  
“You idiot… why would we even be talking about the sky? Really, the sky?” Tetra sighed exaggeratedly.  
And at that moment Link started to chuckle lowly, being quickly noticed by the other two, who stopped arguing and stared at him.  
Link looked at the floor and whispered a quick thank you, which was received by smiles from both adults.

Tetra, after an uncomfortable moment of silence, decided to ask Link how his acceptance test had gone.  
“A-Ah, that? Well, I think I did pretty good I guess? I don’t really know… But I met someone really kind and we are friends now, she even invited me to have a tour of the school next Wednesday! Her name’s Mipha Aqua and for some reason, I feel like I’ve seen her before?” Link questioned himself, receiving dumbfounded glances from the other two. “Well, she said that she was sure I would pass! But I’m not so sure about that…” He sighed, deeply conflicted.  
While he was immersed in his thoughts, Tetra and Gale were whispering behind him.  
“He can’t mean that Mipha, right?” She asked incredulously, stressing the that as to make her point.  
“I think it is that one though, besides, Aqua? That should make it clear, shouldn’t it?” He lifted his eyebrow, confusion clear in his face.  
“Then how come Link doesn’t have any idea…?” She sighed before turning to face her cousin. “That’s great! But isn’t she one of the so-called ‘Champions’ there? If she believes in you, then you should believe in her, after all, she has more experience in this, I imagine she can tell who’s going to enter… More or less.” Tetra ended awkwardly.

“Wait. Why didn’t you tell him who she was?” Gale whispered, making Link curious as to what they were talking about.  
“I think it’s best if he connects the dots himself… Now, Shh! He’s getting suspicious.” Tetra slapped the back of her boyfriend’s head before turning with a smile.  
“What do you say about finally going home and eating that ice cream, Link?”  
The youngest one looked at the other two suspiciously before shrugging and agreeing.

After a rather tiring day, both physically and emotionally, Link finally went to sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Remember you can find me at my tumblr tloz4days! I find it funny how I can never find another way to mention WW Link without saying Gale lol


	5. A Visit and A Surprise

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here goes another chapter! At least the next one's actually finished this time, haha... but still, to wait a month is really a bit too much...  
> As always, really thank you for every single kudo and comment!  
> My english's not perfect, so if there are any errors, do let me know!  
> I hope you enjoy, next chapter's pretty exciting, and longer than this one, whoops!

Those five days had already gone by and Link was getting more worried with each day that passed, trying to enter the most prestigious school was not an easy task and he guessed that a lot of people had applied too. His fitful nights hadn’t been of any help either, he kept having the same dream every single time, it was the same fuzzy vision he had before but it slowly became clearer with time. 

Now he was sure that what he saw was an elephant but at the same time a machine? And the blue dot also became clearer, there he could see someone identical to himself, just older, sitting next to the red dot. That one hadn’t changed at all. Maybe it was trying to tell him something? That night he could have sworn that he heard them speaking, something about how after all that had ended they could go back to how it was before… 

They left him feeling melancholic every morning, but each day he forgot about it, something more worrying, his applying test, took up all his thoughts until night, where that strange dream would invade his mind and he didn’t even know why. 

That being said, after a gloomy morning, Link started getting ready as if nothing had ever happened. Since he was currently on vacation everything he did was done leisurely. After a quick shower, he put on some casual clothes and went down to eat breakfast. 

Tetra had left him a note, she was probably out working and was kind enough to leave him his plate of breakfast. He turned on the TV and started eating while watching the news. He managed to hear something about a show near his home that weekend before the program ended. 

Link sighed happily after eating and started making himself some popcorn. If he was alone in the house, then why not make the most out of it? He flipped channels until he found a movie that he liked following the one that had just ended. 

The movie was starting when the popcorn was ready. It was the first part of his favorite saga, even though some people said it was pretty boring since the plot never changed, he still found it pretty interesting. Poor them who missed out on these majestic pieces of art.

The movie was reaching its climax when Link noticed that he had run out of popcorn. Since he didn’t want to miss the part were the ‘Demon Lord’ kidnapped for a second time the childhood friend for his master, he went to the counter and left the bowl there, finally seeing Tetra’s note.

He guessed he could read it after the movie, so he took it and left it on the table.

After a tearful ending, Link wiped his eyes and took notice of the note he had left there before. His eyes widened after reading it though. 

Apart from saying that she had indeed gone to work, she reminded him that Mipha had offered to give him a view of the school and he couldn’t be late for it.

He thanked the goddesses for having someone like Tetra since he had totally forgotten about it, what with the movie and those dreams he had been having. He luckily still had like an hour and a half until he had to go, so after doing nothing at all for who knows how long, he decided to get properly dressed and clean his face.

After getting himself ready and checking the time, Link left his house more relaxed than the last time he had gone through that route. 

Once he had arrived, he saw a gigantic board where he supposed all the accepted new student’s names would be put on. He hoped that in a few days’ time he could see his name in there…

Now that he could see the entrance calmly, he noticed all of the reigns’ emblems in a circle, around the so-called ‘Triforce’ the old tales talked about, or so he had understood by his history classes.

He was a little bit lost here, what with so many students around and how big it all was. He guessed that if he didn’t want to cause a commotion then he probably shouldn’t ask about Mipha or any of the Champions for that matter.

So as to not be stuck there for more than what was necessary, he started taking slow steps towards what he thought was the main building, he never quite managed to make it though, as halfway there he bumped into someone, falling to the floor.

His first response was to duck his head, slightly trembling and looking in an emotionless way at the floor. But he quickly caught himself and stopped that reflex he had formed so long ago. 

Still, before he could get up or even look at who he had bumped into, a hand was offered. Shocked, he looked at the hand like it was an alien until it moved right in front of his face. 

He took it and looked up at the other person, surprisingly finding a familiar face.  
“R-Ravio? What? Is it really you?” He was dumbfounded by getting to see someone who had been one of his best friends when he was little again after so long.

“Link? I knew that I had seen this face somewhere before! It’s been so long, my friend! I need to take you to Hilda and Glam, they’ll be so happy when they see you!” Ravio smiled and started pulling him up. 

“W-Wait! I can’t g-” He was promptly cut off as Ravio started to walk quickly in the direction he supposed his other two childhood friends were.

“By the way, why are you here? I didn’t know that you knew we went to Hyrule Academia!” Ravio looked back at Link curiously, slowing down his pace. 

“That’s actually what I was trying to tell you about. But I don’t know if I can actually say it.” Link was in the process of debating whether telling him was a good idea or not, given how when he first met Mipha she had been hiding from everyone.

“C’mon man, you can’t just say that to me! Aren’t we childhood friends? I thought we had mutual trust, but it seems like I had been wrong all this time…” Ravio started playing the victim to convince Link. He had always been so interested in the drama club after all.

Link sighed before agreeing, but before he started spilling, he asked Ravio to please keep his reaction to a minimum.  
“Well actually… I came here to ‘get a tour’.” Link used air quotes at that last part. “And to be honest I don’t even know how to find the person I’m looking for, since…”  
“Since?” Ravio prompted him to continue.  
“Since she’s Mipha Aqua, one of the Champions…?” Link tried to whisper as low as he could but at the same time so he could be heard by his friend.

“WHAT?!? MISS AQU-” Ravio was shouting before he was muffled by Link’s hand.  
“Shhh! I just told you to be quiet Ravio!” Link sighed disappointed, he should have seen it coming. Then he looked to the sides, knowing full well that they were on the receiving end of curious stares. There was even someone who came to ask if they were okay.

Some minutes later Ravio was still looking at Link incredulously.  
“Are you serious? She’s one of the Champions! I have been here for more than five years and only talked to her once! Not only that, but she’s also that famous… You’re not following me, right?” Ravio sighed exasperatedly while Link could only laugh.  
“But how come? This is so unfair! I’m totally telling Hilda and Glam about this later.” Ravio pouted, being totally childish.  
“Wait, you can’t! Or more like I wish you wouldn’t… What if I’m not accepted? You guys would never forget it! And I don’t think that Mipha would like that either… So I want this to stay as unnoticeable as possible.” Link made a puppy face or something quite similar to Ravio so he couldn’t avoid accepting the request.  
“He’s calling Miss Aqua just by her name? Wow, Link’s sure got lucky someone hasn’t killed him for calling her like that.” Ravio whispered to himself. “Fine, fine. Just promise me that even if you don’t enter, which I doubt very much, you will come to visit us, okay? We all haven’t been together since we were like ten!” Ravio held his pinky up, just like Link remembered him do many times when they were younger. After singing its song, he was suddenly reminded of what he was doing before crashing with his friend, starting to panic.

“Oh no, oh no, oh no, she must think I ditched her, where can I find her? Will she be angry? She must hate me now, oh my goddesses what do I do?!?” Ravio looked strangely at him.  
“Hey Mr. Panic, calm down a little? When were you supposed to meet her?” Link looked at his phone and seeing that he still had a few minutes to spare, let out a big sigh.  
“Good job, Mister Link. You have successfully panicked over nothing, for the… Oh, who am I kidding, I have never counted them to begin with!” Ravio laughed while the blonde glared good-naturedly at his friend.  
“Yes, of course, Ravio. As if you knew how to count!” Link replied snarkily.  
“Hey, that’s rude! You know that I was the best there ever was at maths!” The dark-haired boy stuck his tongue out, making fun of the other’s comment.  
“Yeah sure, whatever lets you sleep at night. Anyway, I better get going to the entrance, she’ll probably be waiting for me there! Bye!” And just like that Link left.

After running to the entrance he could see the red-haired girl he met the other day, so he raised his hand to greet her, but then he also saw Daruk, Urbosa, Zelda and Revali?!? What were they all doing here in costumes? He had honestly thought it was just going to be Mipha and him! Wouldn’t they attract a lot of attention this way? It’s not like their disguises were any good either! 

Link stood there dumbfounded while Mipha approached sheepishly. “Hey there! How are you doing Link?” She smiled embarrassed before talking again. “Such a beautiful day, isn’t it?” Mipha laughed awkwardly before getting close and whispering. “I’m so sorry, I mentioned a friend was coming today and then Urbosa said she was coming because she wanted to keep me safe, Daruk was interested… Anyway, it all escalated from there. You probably thought it was going to be just us and not six people.” She apologized for the situation. 

“That’s… Okay, I guess. I don’t really mind. But don’t you think that you guys stand out… a little?” And that was a big understatement. The students seemed to forcefully be ignoring them, but even so they couldn’t keep their eyes away completely.  
“No, not at all! We’ll be fine, I promise!” Mipha smiled at Link innocently, so purely that it was impossible to sense even the slightest sarcasm in her voice. His only thought was that she must be really dense. 

Link was sighing in defeat when he could hear Revali talk. “Hey, who’s this guy and why are we waiting for him, he made us wait a whole lot! I don’t want to spend my precious free afternoon with a Mr. No one. I’m gone.” He couldn’t even digest all that egocentric statement before Revali was walking away, only to be quickly stopped by Urbosa, who whispered something in his ear then came back with him wrapped under her arm, one smiling and the other scowling.  
Mipha turned first to Link and told him to not mind Revali at all, then to the aforementioned person, frowning and ready to chastise him. 

While that was happening, Daruk and Zelda chose to get closer to Link, if only to greet him.  
Daruk gave him a big slap to his back, as to which he felt the same spark of electricity that he had before with Mipha, just that this time he saw a strange salamander machine, a big white and light brown blur, and the same blue blur he saw with the red-haired girl. He noticed he had spaced out, so he tried to keep it cool and massaged his back, making an instant note to evade those slaps fervently.  
“Hello, little guy! Heard you were coming from Mipha and it made me want to come too! Her family’s got a great eye on things like these, if she’s invited you then that means you’ll surely pass!”  
Link was about to greet him back and thank him but Zelda chose to speak just before.  
“That would be correct, while it is not a hundred percent sure that this is going to happen, it is very probable. And your performance was nothing to scoff at either. We will welcome you, and everyone who enters, with open arms.” She smiled at the end, though for some reason he could feel it was partly fake.

“Um… Thank you both! That really is a big help. It has been my wish to enter this academy since I was little after all. I also want to apologize for arriving so late, the truth is… Once I arrived here I didn’t know where to look, so I tried to go to the main hall, but then I crashed with someone and…” He trailed off.  
Link saw Zelda’s eyes flash and instantly he felt that he could be in trouble. “You didn’t… have any kind of problems at all, did you?” Her eyes were now glinting dangerously.  
“No! No.” He rubbed his hands against his pants. “Not at all, I just crashed with someone I knew… Since we were little…” He got quieter and quieter after his first outburst.  
“So a childhood friend, huh? That’s great little guy! If you had gotten in trouble when it’s not even your first day, that would have been bad!” Daruk laughed loudly. Link was sure that with someone like this around, it was impossible not to notice that they were the Champions. But then, if it was so obvious, what would the students think, seeing a Mr. No one, how Revali said, walking around and being friendly with their Champions? Oh, he was going to be so dead. Link was going to have to bid goodbye to his life after this. 

At that point of desperation Mipha came back smiling, followed by a defeated Revali and a proud Urbosa, effectively distracting Link.

“So, why don’t we get going already? If we don’t start this tour now then we’ll never get it done!” And just like that she took Zelda’s hand and started walking. Link followed soon after with Daruk, Urbosa and Revali going last, the bluenette still showing remorse in his expression. 

“First things first, this is obviously the main hall, to your right is Ms. Impa’s office, to the left is the infirmary and right here, ” Mipha showed a giant piece of wood with a map on top of it. “is a map of the building. There is one in each building so you shouldn’t get really lost, y’know? There’s also our own office and the student council’s room. Hmm… There’s a cafeteria at the end of the hall, and the teacher’s room is right next to it. I don’t think I’m forgetting anything, am I?” Mipha turned to Zelda.  
“The cafeteria is not the only one in this facility, this one’s mainly used by visitors and teachers, but anyone can use it.” Zelda explained. “The infirmary is formed by our own students and teachers. Mipha leads that department with the help of Malon, a university student. She does a very good job, I must admit.” Mipha blushed at Zelda’s comment, not expecting to be called out like that. “I-It’s nothing much, I just like to help.” She stuttered. “Nothing much she says. Everyone who has been treated by her thinks that an angel saved them.” Urbosa informed, receiving a squeak of “Urbosa!” from the other red-haired girl. This natural exchange between friends made Link smile. He wished he could have something like that again soon… 

“Next! We’re going to the courts! There are lots of clubs here so we have lots of courts too! I’m sure you must know Urbosa’s volleyball team or Daruk’s football team! Even though they’re rather new, I can say that they are exceptional when they play! You can see the medals they’ve already won when we arrive at the sports section. The hall of victory is an important part of the school, cause it has been there since the academy was founded.” Mipha explained on their way. 

Once they arrived, Link saw an impressive display of various trophies, medals, and some framed pictures to his left, while to his right there were lots of courts, most of them being used, and further away he saw a big forest. This place sure was huge, and they have only seen two places yet!

“Well, there’s also the schools and colleges, you know, that was a little bit obvious. Each one of them has a map of the building so you shouldn’t be so lost… Hopefully. Next, we’re going to the dormitories! Or, just outside. Someone will give you a full-length tour once you enter.” 

Mipha was the official tour guide, Link guessed. Urbosa and Zelda were having their own private conversation meanwhile Daruk followed the tour excitedly as if it was his first time around here. Revali was, albeit begrudgingly, following at Daruk’s other side. Which is exactly why he heard him scoffing and whispering “if he actually manages to pass” as to which Daruk replied, trying to whisper as the other had, with “Hey brother, that’s rude, not cool. He’ll surely pass!” only for Revali to roll his eyes. 

Which actually reminded him of the biggest problem he had at that moment. Would he actually pass? Wouldn’t this all be in vain if he didn’t? Everyone would be so disappointed…  
Wait! He can’t be thinking like that, just where’s his confidence? He really ought to leave that part of him in the past, new school, new him? 

Once they had walked for some time, he saw six buildings, really similar, if not for the different symbols there were at the entrance of each one. They were huge, like, really. From what he could see, they were divided into two wings, he supposed one for girls and the other for boys? 

“So here we are! These buildings are also part of the kingdom’s system so we as Champions are in charge of maintaining order… Or well, partly, since we are still relatively young. And as you could guess, they’re also divided by gender. If you ever have problems with anything, we sleep on the last floor.” Then, Mipha pointed over to the sixth building, “and that’s the one teachers use! So be sure to not cause a ruckus, okay?” She winked at him and chuckled. 

Urbosa, suddenly at Link’s other side, scaring him, decided to add something. “It’s not compulsory to sleep here in the dormitories… At least until you reach high school. For a more friendly atmosphere, we are supposed to stay here and get to know each other. Although we can’t really say much about the matter, Champions duties and all that. It does help with organizing though.” 

“That doesn’t mean you can’t find middle or elementary schoolers though! It is weird seeing those little children playing around the dormitories sometimes, but really cute at the same time!” Daruk excitedly added. 

Wow, this academy was way more than he’d have ever imagined.

Did this mean that he’d have to live there if he entered? Maybe it would do him some good… He’d surely miss Tetra and Gale though. 

“Can we go now? Like, please? I’m really hungry, you people.” Revali started to walk off in the direction of the cafeteria he was shown at the beginning of the tour. 

Urbosa sighed and whispered, “that bird… Why is he always like this?” and then started following.  
Link stayed behind as to walk beside Mipha, a big question now present in his mind.  
“Won’t everyone be wondering who I am? Since I’m walking around with you, the Champions, and I guess that’s not something they see every day.”  
Mipha looked at him confused. “What are you talking about? No one can recognize us since we’re disguised! Nothing’s going to happen, okay?” She gave him some soft pats in his back and started following the others.

Link could only sigh, he had a feeling this would not end well.


	6. Craziness Ahead!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here I come! With a new chapter! Well, duh.  
> THANK YOUUUUU FOR THE KUDOS AND BOOKMARK, I saw that ;)  
> I hope you enjoy!!! <3

They’d been walking for some time, and Link could feel every person they passed staring at him as if he was an alien or something similar. They weren’t even at the main hall yet… He sighed yet again. The Champions sure were admired huh? He’s sure he wouldn’t be able to be on the receiving end of all that attention. ”Well sure, a little attention can’t be that bad sometimes but… Constantly? I’m not so sure about that.” Link thought to himself.

Once they were at the cafeteria, he could feel fewer eyes on him, maybe because there were also fewer students there than outside, there were some teachers around, but they weren’t as intrigued as everyone else… mostly. 

He was amazed by the different kinds of food they offered, but in the end, he chose something simple that he ate often.  
Then, he just followed Mipha like a baby duck followed its mom, it’s not like he knew anyone else there but he also wanted to ask her something that had been bugging him since he got here.

“Hey, Mipha?” he waited for a moment where the other four were talking between themselves. “I’ve been wondering this for a while. Why are there so many students here if you’re supposedly in a break?” But it seemed like Zelda had also been listening, as she was the one who answered. 

“Many students are back around this time because either they already went to visit their families, or just simply didn’t travel. In our case, we all already visited our families and had to come back earlier because of our Champion duties. Classes start in less than two weeks anyway.”  
After that Link was deep in thought, the Champions sure had a lot of duties, they even started their responsibilities before the other students!  
“That must be hard…” Link whispered, thinking how they were so responsible already compared to him, he just felt like a baby in a big body! And they were the same age! 

Then he just heard a “tch”, making him look up, just then discovering that everyone was looking at him. Had they heard what he just said? Were they offended or just waiting for an answer? 

He definitely felt more nervous than he supposed he looked when they were just… Staring. But soon Revali got tired of it and “tch”ed again, looking to the side and not quite whispering, “how can someone be so ignorant?” melodramatically, totally dispersing the previously atmosphere. 

Urbosa hit his head and whispered something menacingly in his ear by what Link could get from his reaction. Mipha sighed and turned to the blonde once again. 

“As Zelda explained, that’s why many of us are already here, others just like spending their time here, got nothing to do or can’t visit their family, ” she smiled before continuing, “but don’t worry! Our families are always happy to see us, at least I enjoyed my time with them a lot. You know, I have a little brother named Sidon? He’s only two years younger than me, but he’s such a cutie!” 

She cut her rambling abruptly and then got really thoughtful, “But there’s also something I’ve been thinking about all day… I really don’t know why Revali is being so… rude today? He’s not normally like this, I mean, he is arrogant sometimes, to people he doesn’t know. But at this level? It’s truly surprising. Normally he at least has manners…” 

The redhead sighed once again, it has truly been ticking her off, Link was a good guy! She could feel his unease in this situation, why couldn’t Revali be good with someone outside of their circle for once?

While Mipha was in his own head, Link thought that seemed… not credible. But then Daruk started talking about his club to Link, saying how he would be perfect for running since he was slim and not that tall, and also by his performance in the test? He told Link he was his jackpot, but the blonde didn’t know how to get Daruk to either calm down a little since he wasn’t even in yet or outright reject the offer, but that seemed a little bit rude to him.

Urbosa and Zelda were probably lecturing Revali, with the stern faces they were making and how Urbosa seemed to have the (not) poor boy in a headlock while Revali, glaring at her, was making also poor attempts at getting her arms out of his neck. 

The students that surrounded them looked at their table dreamily, with clear wishes of also joining it, and the glares that were thrown Link’s way were definitely not ignored, even if they were mostly out of a good-natured jealousy. 

The blonde felt as if the daggers that were thrown his way were actually physical, he would be dead and stabbed all over his body, that was such a funny thought, right?

They thanked for their lunch, Mipha giving Link the evil eye as for him to not pay, and left the building. That’s when everything started getting out of hand. 

It seemed like a student had enough courage to approach them and wanted to ask Mipha something, being followed by two friends.

“Excuse me, Miss Aqua, but may I ask what brings you all around here?” They left it like that for a minute before their curiosity got the better of them. “And more importantly, the one who is accompanying you all is…?” 

They all, sans Link, were really surprised. Weren’t the disguises enough? Before that, they had always worked. Link sighed internally, having already predicted it was bound to happen. His reaction though was different. He hid a little behind Daruk, if only for his presence to be less noticeable. 

But alas, the students were smarter than that, and in turn, the ones who had been listening started surrounding them in hopes of getting an answer. 

They were suddenly swarmed, and Link didn’t quite know how to get out of this one, at least until he felt someone grab his hand and start running, feeling that same spark that he had felt earlier that day, getting a flash of what looked like the older him in a village or something, it gave off a ‘home’ feeling. He followed blindly, too busy thinking about that strange image to care, but hoping that at least it was one of the Champions and not one of the students that oh so desperately wanted to know who he was. He felt a huge shudder which snapped him out of his reverie and made him look at who was in front of him.

He was really surprised when he saw who was pulling him to find no other than Mr. Arrogance grabbing his hand quite strongly, he might say. He looked back and saw the other four trying to somehow defuse their situation. 

Once they rounded the corner and were sure that no one had followed them, then and only then did Revali turn to face him. He looked bothered by what he had just done, more so for the fact that he had to come with him alone instead of staying with everyone else.

“Tch, this is such a bother. Why did I have to bring you,” and at this he looked pointedly at Link, as if everything had been his fault. It kind of was, but that’s not the point, since it wasn’t his intention. “over here, why not Mipha? She was the one who invited you here!” In his anger, he started badly imitating Zelda’s voice. “You go with him Revali, get him out of here, you are good at being sneaky, I know you can do this. Also Mipha’s quite busy so… you would be the best option, be a dear and do it? Ugh.” 

Link had guessed that Revali wasn’t really fond of him, just like Urbosa and Zelda, but really? Did he have to be this overly dramatic? At least the princess had been right about one thing, as sneaky as he had been, he went totally unnoticed. Maybe it had been because he’s short too, not like he was tall either but still. 

He looked to the multitude right around the corner and couldn’t help but sigh, seems like his visit was cut rather short, poor Mipha, she was surrounded by people…  
“If you’re thinking about leaving now, I’ll seriously kill you. You get us all into trouble and then just leave? The least you could do is stay,” Revali started, looking incredibly annoyed at a surprised Link. “Really? It was written all over your face. I don’t even know what they all saw in you.” He sighed again.

“I-I wasn’t planning on leaving! You’re just imagining things!” Link desperately said.

“Oh, really?” And at this he got really close to Link, their noses almost touching and smiled, making the poor boy flush. “And what’s with this worried face and the desperate tone?” He flicked the blonde’s nose and laughed, getting away while making fun of him, but unknowingly he had also caused the other’s heart to start beating erratically. 

After a second Link tried to calm down, not being quite successful, but wondered if he was coming down with something, or if it was just because his personal space was just… intruded upon. 

“T-That’s...” Link left it hanging in the air, he didn’t know what to say. 

“Don’t even try it, I already read right through you,” Revali deadpanned. “You can’t fool me, for I can’t be deceived by something as simple as...” And then he motioned to Link. 

He didn’t know whether to be offended by being called simple or disappointed that Mr. Arrogance was back once again. 

“Anyway, since I” He emphasized this part, “can’t be anything less than perfect, you’re staying with me until the others come back.” He whispered through his teeth, “Even if I really don’t want to.”  
“Not like I could go anywhere else than outside, passing right beside that huge multitude over there which got formed because they wanted to know who I was and why I was with the Champions of the academy, yeah, just my cup of tea. I want to get out of this alive, thank you.” Link whispered to himself.

He sat down by a bench that was across them, Revali stayed where they had been, his back against the wall. Link looked curiously at him for a few seconds, before letting his mind wander off, thinking about what had happened that last week, all about the dreams, the test, his nervousness, the panic he had felt at the ice cream parlor almost a week ago… everything.

He was so deep in his thoughts he didn’t notice that he had spent all that time looking at Revali. Until, of course, he had to point it out, breaking his moment of peace and meditation.

“What is it, am I too beautiful for your eyes? I wouldn’t be surprised, after all everyone adores me.” He smirked at Link, each time he spoke up he gave off a more narcissistic vibe, he couldn’t help but think, and also laugh at that statement, because if he counted as ‘someone’ then everyone sure didn’t adore Revali, not him at least.

“No, that’s… no.” Link answered, barely containing his laughter, which the bluenette must have noted, because the next thing he was doing was glare furiously at him, if stares could kill, then he would be more than dead by now. Although the glare was reciprocated, so for the next two minutes they just glared at each other.

A cough and a sigh interrupted their session. “Really Revali? We leave you for five minutes and you’re already fighting.” Urbosa was the one who arrived first, being closely followed by the other four. He managed to hear Mipha’s voice mentioning something about their disguises, and that they had been totally unrecognizable before and how come this time they knew, before they rounded the corner. 

“Just for your information, we weren’t fighting. He,” Revali said with disgust. “insulted me and I, of course, did the mature thing and just brushed it off.” He was still glaring at Link, so his argument wasn’t effective. 

Urbosa and Revali kept arguing while the other three approached Link. Mipha was the first one to talk, asking whether what the other had said was true and if he was okay. He shook his head, he hadn’t insulted Revali at all! Or maybe he did laugh at him a little, but never insulted, he was just being melodramatic again.  
“We’re also very sorry for what just happened, little guy! We weren’t expecting everyone to go cuckoo over who was with us.” Daruk tried to give him ‘pats’ again, but Link narrowly avoided them, thanking the goddesses for that. He smiled, a bit thinly, but tried to tell them that everything was okay.  
“Revali didn’t do anything to provoke you, right?” Zelda asked, already expecting something like how he had been really rude.

Link was about to tell her that yes, he had been really rude, when he remembered how he had out of nowhere gotten really close and smiled, that had been quite a shock. He felt his cheeks getting red again and managed to stutter out a quick no before announcing that he needed to go to the bathroom. Link heard Mipha shout something, but in his hurry he didn’t really understand what it was.

After a few minutes the blonde guesses that what Mipha had probably tried to tell him that the bathrooms were not that way, because to be honest, he never felt more lost in his life. He had somehow ended up in the middle of a forest while he was deep in his thoughts, also the fact that it was a forest didn’t help at all, what with there being trees everywhere and some animals that were looking at him curiously.

“Really? How is a forest in any way needed? Now I can’t even remember how I ended up here…”

After a few seconds Link screamed in desperation and lamented the fact that he wasn’t one of the few lucky people that could fly with their magic.

“I didn’t even want to go to the bathroom! Why didn’t I just stop walking once I was far away?!?” He brought his hands up to his head and was about to groan in frustration when he heard a twig snap. He took some deep breaths to calm himself and, trying to be sneaky, turned in the direction of the sound. He expected a small animal, a squirrel maybe, or even a student, or well, anything that could save him! 

But… a horse, and one that wasn’t even full-grown either? What was a horse doing in a forest alone? He looked at it, totally surprised, before it neighed and started walking the other way.

Once it had taken a few steps, it turned to look at him and neighed again.

Well, this was… unexpected. He shook his head and ran to catch up with the horse, putting his life in its hands, kind of.  
After a few minutes, they arrived at a clearing. It was impressive, there was a beautiful lake, the sun was just perfect and there were lots of animals, it seemed like it was pulled straight out of a fairy tale!  
The horse, Link wondered if it had a name or whose was it, pushed him until he was in front of the lake, a big stone in which he could seat by the side. Maybe this was not outside, but it wasn’t such a bad place to be, he would rather be here than still lost in that huge forest. 

“I’m still lost but… yeah. At least I hope people come here often.” Link sighed, about to sit down. 

Really, he wouldn’t mind staying there a bit longer if only he knew how to go back. Since he didn’t have any great ideas on how to get back, he took some time to look at his reflection in the lake, since the waters were crystal clear, it was almost as if he was seeing himself in a mirror.

He grew bored of it quickly though, so he looked around and found an apple tree, deciding to get some, for him and maybe as a thank you gift for the horse for bringing him here… It deserved at least that.  
He tried to not disturb the other animals that were oh so peacefully spending their time there, but then he saw that there was no way that he could grab those apples, so he had to climb it.

Some birds flew away, but Link wasn’t really that disappointed, it could have ended up worse than that.

After jumping down from the tree with the apples in hand, he went to the small lake, where the young mare was drinking some water. It seemed like it noticed his approach, since it got up to look at him. He didn’t really know how to give the fruit to the horse, so he just offered it, lifting his hand until the apple was right in front of its mouth, although he was kinda scared of it biting his hand off or something.  
It took the fruit happily, and Link was thankful that nothing bad had happened. 

After a moment, he sat in the rock he had been in earlier, the horse following him and staying close by, while he ate his apple. Link felt courageous all of a sudden and decided to start petting the horse. It seemed quite relaxed and didn’t mind the petting, so he continued, wondering if the others had noticed that he hadn’t returned yet and probably got lost, until suddenly, the horse heard something and took off running, nowhere to be seen and leaving him all alone in the clearing, the other animals were gone too.

He only managed to get a “Wa-!” out when he heard someone landing right behind him.  
He turned and saw the last person he would expect to have come.

“Revali?” Link said, shocked.  
“Yes, it’s me, of course. I know you’re so glad I came to your rescue and everything, you can thank me later, but… just what in the world are you doing here?” He said, half curious and half annoyed.  
“What? Should I not be here? Or is it because I… was supposed to go to the bathroom?” Link started off worried but ended speaking very sheepishly. It was a little bit embarrassing, truly. How does one even end up in a forest anyway?

Revali sighed and shook his head, Link thought that with the face he was pulling, he’d rather be on the other side of the Earth than helping him, but he didn’t know the way back and it seemed like the other was the only one who could help him since he could fly.

Well, he was rather special then, wasn’t he? Not like he’d say it to boost Mr. Arrogance’s ego. 

“You’d never understand. Anyway let’s do this quickly,” He glanced at Link. “For both of us. Just get in my back and hold on tight.”

Link got to work quickly, covering the rest of the apple with a handkerchief and leaving it in his pocket, he’d never throw trash in such a place. The part of actually getting on Revali’s back was a little weird, their heights weren’t that much apart, so that was not a problem, but he didn’t know how to hold on to him, and where to not touch, what if Revali got ticklish and dropped him mid-flight?

But Revali’s patience was wearing thin, and he took charge of the situation by placing Link’s hands near his neck, and showing him just where exactly to put his legs. Link could swear he felt a chilly wind hit his cheeks, just as if he was back in that strange village, but as soon as it came, it disappeared.

“It really shouldn’t be this hard… Are you sure we are the same age?” Somehow, even with Link’s weight on him, he seemed unperturbed, and Link let the insult pass by without him even noticing, too busy wondering just how much strength did the other have.  
Revali let his comment hang in the air before he spoke again, a little awkward because of the silence he was met with. “If you fall off when we’re flying it won’t be my fault, I warned you.” He said devilishly.

“Wait, what-” Link started, but never quite got to finish as Revali took off like a shot. The next minute was spent by Link screaming Revali’s ear off and almost choking him, him wishing he could purposely drop the other just so his hearing could be saved and at times going faster to make the other suffer, kind of counterproductive, at least until the blonde finally calmed down and started admiring the view.

Hyrule Academia really looked impressive from up there, but Revali had seen things like this many times before, and even higher up, so he was used to it. Instead, Link was this close to letting his hands drop just so he could feel the air hitting his face, and maybe try some weird things, he had never been this high up, he had never flown! He felt like he was back to being a child, but he really couldn’t do that unless he wanted to fall to his death, so he grabbed Revali just a little bit tighter, just in case.

Too soon for Link’s taste they were in front of the main building, the other Champions were kind of waiting for them, sitting in a bench that was just a bit farther away, a group of students surrounding them.

After Link had let go, Revali stretched for a bit before starting to walk to where the others were.

“Wait!” Link caught Revali’s arm, getting another flash of that village which gave off a ‘homey’ feeling, but this time the older him, he guessed? Was in a platform, waiting for someone probably. He shook his head, effectively dissipating the image once again, but Revali seemed to be in his own head. What if…? No, it couldn’t be, could it? 

He didn’t have a long time to dwell on it as just a second later Revali let himself free of Link’s hold and rudely asked “What do you want now?”  
The image had gotten the blonde off track, but soon enough he remembered what he had wanted to say, so in favor of that he let the insult pass. Not like it was anything he wasn’t used to.

“That was awesome Revali! We were so high up, it was incredibly beautiful. Thank you for saving me and showing me something so marvelous, it was the first time I was so high up, I loved it!” Link smiled widely. 

The bluenette was caught off guard, and he felt his cheeks grow hot, just like the blonde’s had been before.  
“I-Uh-I...” He coughed into his hand and tried to compose himself. “Of course it was awesome or marvelous, I’m the best after all, anything less than that would be a disgrace. And you’re welcome, just one more thing to add to my long list of good deeds I did today.” He laughed proudly, hiding his embarrassment in an arrogant masquerade. 

Maybe a bit too soon for Link, he had to bid goodbye to the Champions, who wished him a good afternoon and gave him some reassuring words, well, most of them did. He still felt happy anyway.


	7. Danger, Danger!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Man... I'm so sorry for the long wait, and it’s not that long. I've had this one just sitting there for a long time, the next one is the problem I guess, since I haven't finished that one yet hahaha...  
> Anyway, thanks for all the kudos! I appreciate them a whoooooole lot! I hope you can enjoy this chapter!  
> It's... not really pretty?? There's a really disturbing carácter so um... tw for bullying and someone being a psycho. Kinda.  
> I sure don't know how to explain.  
> Still, hope you like it!  
> Oh, almost forgot. Merry Christmas! I guess.

It was the day for Link to know the results of the entrance test, he was nervous but he tried not to be, remembering Mipha and Daruk’s support. He got ready quickly, grabbed something to eat, and with only an “I’ll be back later!”, left for the academy. He felt like those protagonists in those comics he read, when they went with friends to see if they entered the school they wanted or not, just that he was… alone. He ignored his negative thoughts and just continued his way to the building. 

Once he arrived there, there was a multitude surrounding what he guessed was a board or something with the results. There were some kids with their parents, other teenagers like him trying to see if they were accepted and even college students! Well, it was to be expected, but truly, the amount of people was surprising.  
“So this is what it means to be the best of the best, huh...” As time passed, he got more disheartened, if there were so many, then how in the world would he be able to enter? He didn’t have any special skill yet… 

He once again tried to dissipate those negative thoughts, he couldn’t let what happened in the past bring him down now! And what about Daruk and Mipha? They believed in him, so he should believe in them too!

Starting to make way to the front of the crowd, he managed to see a gigantic board with the ones who were accepted. He was tense, but he tried to remain calm until he could find the grade he was supposed to be in, there it was!  
“9th grade, Link, Link, Link...” He muttered to himself as he went further down. He could feel his heartbeat getting more intense as he got closer and closer to where he supposed his name could be… He felt as if someone had thrown him a bucket of ice cold water when he couldn’t find it. In his desperation he wondered if maybe he had missed it before, an error? 

As he checked the list upside down for the second time, he saw something weird, there was a name which was not written in the same font as everything else, as if someone else had made it and then glued it on top of another. Now that he noticed, the name wasn’t even in the correct place, it ruined the grammatical order. 

The name though, it made him freeze and start trembling, it couldn’t be. No, it just couldn’t be. He gathered all the courage he could muster at that moment and lifted the piece of paper that was so obviously glued, and under it was… His name. 

He ripped the glued piece up.

Was it for real? Even when he had tried to escape, his demons followed him? Hadn’t they had enough already? He felt anger boiling inside of him, he wanted to shout, cry, run away, anything! He clenched his fists so hard it hurt, he needed some time to calm down.

It never came though, as he made way to a bench on the side, someone roughly grabbed his arm and made him turn. The first thing he saw was that huge frame he could only know so well…

“Well, well, well. What do we have here? Isn’t it pretty boy?” Demise laughed, that awful laugh that always made Link’s blood boil.  
“Isn’t it funny guys?” He turned to his gang, Link had never noticed them there, too busy trying to let himself free from Demise’s hold. “This lowlife thinks he can enter Hyrule Academia? It’s only for special people, like me! Not for you, trash. Get outta here. Now.” He demanded, getting real close to Link’s face, if only he could get in the right position… 

After some seconds, Demise lifted his hand as to punch the other boy, but Link beat him to it, in a swift movement he was out of the boy’s grasp and started getting farther away.  
“Oh, now you’ve done it.” Demise laughed cruelly, getting up from the floor. “The princess has turned rebellious! I think it’s time we teach him a lesson, just like old times!”  
“Just leave me alone, Demise! I’ve never done anything to you, why are you so fixated on me?!?” Link shouted desperately, already running between the crowd. If only he could hide…  
He suddenly collided with someone, what a déjà vu. He got a short flash of the same volcano he had seen two days ago and quickly guessed that it was Daruk. He didn’t have much time to worry about it before he was about to go back to running, unless he wanted Daruk to see him like this, but he shouted a “Wait!” so he thought about his options, maybe it would be best to stay after all.

“What’s going on little… guy?” He started smiling but ended up with a confused face when Link hid behind him. “Shhh!” The blonde interrupted him. Just then, they could see Demise and his gang pass by shouting, “Hey princess, where are you~? You know we just want to play like old times! Don’t try to hide, we’ll find you anyway~.” 

Link felt the blood drain from his face and started shuddering. Daruk noticed this and took action immediately, getting Link inside the school and telling him that everything would be fine, that he’d go deal with them. That seemed to snap Link out of whatever trance he had been in and hold Daruk’s arm a little too fiercely.  
“No, don’t go. They’ll… They’ll…” Then he shook his head, seemingly arming himself with courage. “I-I have to do this, alone.”  
“Are you crazy?!? Look at you, you’re trembling!” And he was right, but Link was determined.  
“Don’t worry, I’ll be fine.” He then whispered to himself, “I hope.” And he took off, but Daruk was also determined, so making a sign to come for Urbosa, who also happened to be near, they followed the blonde boy.

Link was very, truly, incredibly nervous about what could happen to him, but he had to confront them, his past was haunting him at every turn, it was time for it all to stop. This also felt too soon for Link, his scars plagued him and still felt too fresh to rip out but it had to be done. 

He noticed his tormentors too soon for his taste, but went head on to confront them. It seemed like they were quick to notice his presence too, since Demise turned with a smile that couldn’t mean anything good.

“Seems like our highness finally grew a pair and came to meet us. What an honor.” The leader snickered, slowly getting closer to Link.  
“Demise, cut this out. Hasn’t it been enough already? You’re not even in this academy!” Link retaliated. 

“Are you sure about that?” Before continuing, he turned to his gang and ordered them to leave, they were more than a bit confused, but in the end still left. “Because I,” and he took Link’s chin in his hand, softly but at the same time firmly so Link couldn’t get free. “Clearly saw my name in that list over there.” He gasped all of a sudden, making the blonde boy jump. “Could it be? Are you jealous because you didn’t enter? Well, that’s to be expected, someone like you could only dream of entering.” He let the silence hang for a minute before he spoke again. “The closest you’ll ever get to actually entering is standing right here!” And he laughed as if he had made the funniest joke.

Link could feel his spirit getting disheartened, but he mustn’t listen to the likes of… him!  
“Stop it! You know that’s not true, it was MY name in there, and not yours! Just,” Link felt his throat tighten. “JUST WHY do you enjoy my suffering so MUCH!” Link’s tone was turning desperate.

But Demise’s groan put him off, what…?

“Yes, yes, yes. That face, that’s just what I want.” He licked his lips in a disturbing fashion. “I’ve told you before… Your bruised face, your teary face, your angry face, your smile! Yes, I love all that and more! I always dream of beating you up until you fall unconscious, dressing you up as a pretty doll, locking you up in my basement as my personal slave, oh yes, what wouldn’t I do to you…” Demise’s eyes were pure madness now, and he was caressing Link’s cheek, but he wanted nothing more than to run away! “Say… why don’t you just give up…? I would treat you well… All this nonsense would stop and I’d have you all to myself...” 

“Are you insane?!? I wouldn’t give myself to you even if you were the last person standing on Earth! Why would someone willingly accept this abuse?!?” Link finally managed to get away, landing a punch right in Demise’s gut.

“Well...” He laughed, “if I can’t have you then… no one does!” And he was about to hit Link, who of course was trying to protect himself from it before a voice interrupted them.

“And just what is happening here?” Demise stopped dead in his tracks and Link looked back at who had talked. Urbosa! But wait, what was she doing here? Then he looked to her side, Daruk was there. Had they followed him? But then in that case… oh no, how much had they heard?  
“Oh, and who would this be?” Demise smiled pleasantly, as if he hadn’t just been about to punch Link in the face.  
“Just the Champions of this school. And I’m pretty sure we didn’t allow someone who would beat up his classmates enter this academy.” Urbosa said coldly.  
“This? We’re just having fun, aren’t we, Link?” He smiled at him. “Welp, looks like fun time has been interrupted, we’ll see each other again, my princess!” And he blew a kiss to him before disappearing. He could teleport, he had really strong magic after all, he had experienced it firsthand.

“Care to explain why you got what looks like a psychopath after you?” Urbosa now turned to Link, who was clearly more than creeped out by that last gesture.  
“Uh… We were childhood friends, and when I turned seven and he turned eight… things took a turn.” Link tried to explain, but at the same time not giving much detail about the situation.

“He has a really weird vibe going on, little guy. You’ve got to be more careful around him!” Daruk said, leading them back inside the school.  
“Yeah...” Link more or less answered to that out of habit, still wondering just how much of their conversation they heard.  
“Anyway,” Now Daruk was back to his normal self, smiling widely. “You passed! We knew you could do it!” And laughed loudly.  
“Yeah, congrats!” Urbosa, now at his other side, smiled warmly at him. “You must finally be relieved now, you were incredibly tense the other day.”  
“Yeah! I really am happy and relieved!” For more than one reason though, Link thought bitterly.  
“I think Mipha was looking for you before, that’s why we were out here instead of inside the school, with not so many people around.” Urbosa said, her statement being punctuated with many gasps around them and screams of “The Champions!”

“Oh...” Link smiled shyly, “You really didn’t have to, I would’ve been fine alone.” He laughed, ironically noticing how he would not be fine it the other two hadn’t come in when they did. A big not also seemed to pass by both Daruk and Urbosa’s minds.

“It’s okay, we’ve been getting used to it. Also Mipha insisted, she really seems to like you, y’know? Maybe it’s good that she’s making friends outside of our little circle.” She seemed to be deep in thought after that.  
Link flushed red, really? He felt giddy over that fact, he was finally making new friends! Maybe it would be good for him too.  
“Revali didn’t want to come though, so I ended up dragging him out and now we can all enjoy this beautiful day outside!” Daruk laughed again.

After some minutes of peaceful silence, Link spoke quietly. “Um… Daruk, Urbosa? Thank you for saving me back there, I know that wouldn’t have ended pretty if you hadn’t stopped him.”  
They both turned to look at the other boy, that despite being the same age, seemed so small and fragile at that moment. It didn’t help that they were just absurdly tall for their age either.  
“It’s okay little guy! That’s what friends are for!” Daruk directed all his positive energy at Link, who narrowly avoided one of those killer back-slaps he seemed to love doing. 

“I second that, if you’re Mipha’s friend already then you must be a really good person. I don’t think we’ll see each other once the school year starts, but if you need anything, just give us a call!”

And just like that, they were off. Link was left alone with his own thoughts and memories… that morning… he wished that was the first time Demise had said something so disturbing to him, but it wasn’t. And he guessed that it wouldn’t be the last. At least… he hadn’t gone all out in public… 

Link didn’t want to keep thinking about that, so he looked for his keys, entered his home and closed the door.


	8. First Days Sure Are Fun!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There really is a reason behind why I took so long in this. When I last updated, this chapter was about finished. Then, a virus got in my computer and... things happened. I was disheartened over losing my progress so... took some time. And I'm really good at procrastinating hah. Anyway, here it finally is! Can't say it's really exciting, but hope you like it! Kudos and comments are appreciated, thank you~

The day was finally here, it was time. He didn’t know whether to feel anxious or excited, or both! His heart was beating rapidly, it had been so long since he got to feel like this. A new school, new life! And with a bonus of old childhood friends. Just why hadn’t he come here before? 

He quickly got downstairs to eat breakfast while making small talk with Tetra. By the smile on her face, he could guess that she was happy too. Link quickly bid her goodbye and started walking towards the Academy. He had talked to her about how he’d have to go live in the dormitories in about a month, but she was strangely fine with it.

Had Gale talked to her about it beforehand? He had expected more of a resistance before giving in? He wasn’t complaining, but it was surprising. 

Suddenly, a corner away from the building, he felt a presence behind him. A presence he knew pretty well. He tried to not let it affect him as he walked normally, but when it was getting closer, he couldn’t help but quicken his pace. Link cursed at his inability to keep calm even though he should be over it. 

Just a little more, just a little more until he was there. He would have nothing to worry about, the crowd would hide him. 

Or, that’s what he thought until Demise’s hand grabbed his shoulder, effectively stopping him. He felt the other’s breath, but he wasn’t going to let him talk. Link couldn’t stand it anymore. He managed to break free and started sprinting straight to the crowd. The sooner he was there, the sooner he’d be safe.

Once he got there, that damned presence disappeared and he sighed in relief. His thoughts were soon distracted by the voices he heard directing people. Was it the opening ceremony? So he arrived on time after all! 

He followed the mass of people to a big gymnasium, there, it was full of seats, but since most of them were already occupied, he sat in the first one he found empty. He didn’t know anyone, or almost, here after all. And it was a good thing he did, because now the place was packed with people, and an orchestra had started playing the kingdom’s hymn.

“What…?” Link thought to himself. Really, an orchestra? They weren’t holding anything back, were they?

After it, Impa started a speech to motivate the students for the new school year and to give their best in the kingdom’s competitions.   
Then, surprisingly, to Link at least, the Champions appeared from the sides, and the crowd’s mood completely changed. Everyone was shouting… excitedly? And some were chanting their names. It was kind of cool, and perturbing at the same time. 

“I guess they also have to give a speech as Champions, huh. Such a big responsibility…” Link knew he wouldn’t be able to take a place like that, but to each their own, as they say.

Once finished, they were all dismissed. The new students would have to go to their respective buildings for their schedule, and then they were ‘free to wander’ as they told him. Well, you were supposed to ask one of the older students to act as a guide, but why bother when he had been given a tour already? 

Huh… it seemed like they all had ‘kingdom affairs’ three times a week from what he saw.

He did wander off after that anyway. In fact, he had ended up in the same forest as last time without noticing. What snapped him out of his thoughts was the fact that he bumped into someone accidentally and almost lost his footing. He noticed that the one that had bumped into him was wearing purple clothes and… a rabbit hoodie…?

“Woah. I’m sorry- hey, it’s you!” A voice that Link knew spoke. That person lifted his hoodie to reveal that it was no other but Ravio who had bumped into him.

“I had been looking for you everywhere, Link!” The other took his hands excitedly.

“Yeah, I can see that.” Link said sarcastically. “That’s exactly why you were dazed and bumped into me, right?”

“That’s rude! I did end up finding you though.” Ravio remarked smugly.

“Sure, sure. What’s with the rabbit getup anyway? Though coming from you, I should have expected it.” Now Link was teasing him.

“Hey, what’s that supposed to mean.” The purple clothed boy deadpanned. “It’s cute, isn’t it? It was a present from Glam and Hilda for my birthday. It’s so fluffy too! I love wearing it.” He was noticeably smiling.

“You love it huh…” And then Link whispered something by Ravio’s ear which made him turn completely red.

“O-Of course not!!! Who would!? Not me, obviously. Anyway, we gotta go! I told them about you and they’ve been dying to see you again!” The ‘bunny’ changed the topic right away, and since he already had grabbed Link’s hands, he just took off running.

“Hey, wait! Just where are we going!?” For such a skinny boy, Ravio sure had a hidden force, he was practically dragged away.

“Don’t worry about the small things, just follow me!” Was he laughing about this, seriously? Link couldn’t stop the smile that formed on his face either.

Since they hadn’t arrived to their destination yet and Ravio got tired of running, they were now walking normally while Link tried to regain his breath.

“Since… when…” He huffed. “Do you… have this… much stamina?” Sure, doing morning exercise was good, but he wasn’t expecting to do it like this?

“Oh, you know. I’m just one of the best runners there is? We have sooooooo much to catch up on!” There it was, that smug tone again. “But more importantly. Just how do you know Ms. Aqua, one of our Champions, and why do you call her by her first name!?” Why was he so shocked…?

“Ms. Aqua…? Oh, you mean Mipha?” Link was confused about all of this.

“Exactly! Why are you on such friendly terms with her? Have you been friends for a long time and we never knew? But still…” Ravio kept on rambling.

“Not really, we just met when I did my entrance test… why, is it somehow wrong?” He lifted one of his eyebrows skeptically.

“What!? Then how come? I mean, how did you even do it? Did you blackmail her or something?” Ravio grabbed Link’s shoulders and shook him, making the other dizzy. That annoyed the blonde, so he stopped walking and took the other’s hands off.

“Why are you so shocked? And no, do you really think I’d… blackmail someone to be friends?” 

“But! They are a really closed group of friends! Not like they aren’t kind or friendly, everyone admires them, but you just aren’t friends with people like them! Actually, you can’t! They normally don’t let anyone get close to them, they maintain their distance. And if someone has the guts to get too friendly with them… then people say either Urbosa or Daruk pay you a visit! How come you’re…” At this, he gestured to Link with his hands. “Alive?” Link doubted all of the Champions were kind or friendly, specially a bluenette.

“What? I… what? Why do you talk about them like that? I mean, people like them? What are they, royalty or something? Apart from Zelda of course.” Link said sarcastically.

Ravio looked at him utterly flabbergasted for a moment before nodding. “Well, it’s just that. They are royalty, not only Ms. Hyrule, all of them. Seriously, you didn’t know?” When the other shook his head, he continued. “What, have you been living under a rock or something? They’re really famous, you know? Almost like celebrities.” The rabbit-like one sighed.

“N-No way! I mean, I’ve never been much into history, politics and all that but… royalty? No way I’ve been talking with royalty all this time and being so disrespectful, oh, is that somehow treason? Am I going to die? Will I-” Link had started panicking, but Ravio effectively cut him off.

“Link, calm down. Do you understand why I was so curious about it now?” He looked at the other who was only mumbling “Now everything makes sense… so that’s why Tetra...” and then sighed. “I know you’re shocked, but at least listen to me, jeez. We’re about to reach Hilda and Glam after all.” The dark haired boy pulled the other’s ear, managing to get him out of his shocked state.

“Yeah, yeah… you’re right. Sorry, it’s just that… royalty? Seriously? Seems something pulled straight out of a fairy tale book.” Link still couldn’t believe it, was it all a joke?

“I know right? They’re really awesome! Ms. Aqua is pretty well-known as a healing magic genius, some people say she can even bring the dead back to life! I’m pretty surprised you didn’t know.” Ravio replied as he opened a door to a classroom, was it theirs? There, he found Hilda and Glam fumbling with something.

“Hey guys, look who I brought with me!” The bunny hooded one proclaimed, as if the other two hadn’t seen him come in.

“Yeah, we saw. It’s been such a long time, Link!” Glam, one of his childhood friends who was eerily similar to him spoke up while Hilda seemed to be trying to get a message across with Ravio. He pretended not to notice.

“It sure has.” Link tried to not let some gloomy thoughts cloud his happy reunion with his childhood friends.

“Actually… we have a little something for you!” Hilda stood up, strangely excited. He gestured to Ravio again and suddenly the lights went out. He looked to his sides, trying to understand what had happened, but as soon as he tried to move, they came back on and a huge poster was held up by Hilda and Glam. 

“Welcome back, Link!” It said in bright, glittery letters.

“Y-You guys...” His did not know if he should laugh, cry or just sigh. That was so like them. In the end he sighed happily, his eyes getting teary while a big smile was on his face. “I’ve missed you three so much.” He hugged the two who were in front of him and Ravio happily joined in on the group hug. The three said similar sentences to him. He felt like he was back to when he didn’t have a single problem in life.

“We have so much to catch up on!” Glam started once they separated and sat down.   
“It’s been like… what, nine years?” Hilda asked.  
“Yeah, more or less nine years without knowing even a single thing about you three.” Link dropped the bomb. An awkward silence filled the room. 

“You know, I’d think that at least I’d leave a message, a direction... hell, even the name of the city if I was going to move to my friends! But none of you did. Need I say how strange was it that the three of you left, on the same week? What a big coincidence, no?” Of course Link wasn’t going to tell them how everything had gone wrong after that, or how he had cried himself to sleep numerous times, alone, only with his wishful thinking of any of the three contacting him, as he had never been able to find even a single clue as to where they were.

“I… I know that what we did would have been… horrible to you, Link. But I truly didn’t know anything at the time and I didn’t even think we would be gone for so long. As for us three moving at the same time-” Glam started to explain with a crestfallen expression until Hilda cut him off with a rather sad face herself.

“Our actions have no excuses. While we did want to talk to you, we couldn’t.” After a beat, which just confused Link more, she continued. “We can explain, but I think an apology is in order. You don’t know just how many times we wished to be back there, with you and Demise. Playing, singing, running and just having fun, but we couldn’t. We weren’t able to even contact you, and for that, I am very and deeply sorry. Well, not only me, but these two too.” She finished, bowing as she apologized. But it didn’t escape her vision how Link stiffened at the mention of Demise.

A moment passed without anyone making even a single sound, before Link sighed.   
“I… it’s rather hard you know… I mean, of course I still consider you my friends, I didn’t spend so long searching for you to reject this, and I expect to hear the full story behind this, but… I was hurt. Really, and not only because of you leaving but…” He looked at the floor and hugged himself, trying to gather his courage. “There’s something I need to tell you, about Demise.” And so, he braced himself while he tried his best to tell them how… psychotic their friend had been in secret, without being too gruesome, about how he had once found an altar of him in the other’s basement when he had been curious enough. The less terrible things the other had done to him, like the occasional beat up or the bullying. 

The others decided it was enough when he started trembling while telling them about the time he was kidnapped, woke up in that basement right next to the altar, there was a red, sticky fluid on the floor-. A slap brought him back to reality, followed by a hug.

“Link, that’s enough. Stop it, you’re crying.” He was? Link lifted up a hand to his face and felt the wetness in his cheeks, so he was crying… He hadn’t even noticed, so caught up in the moment he was telling. He hugged her back, careful to not get her clothes wet. 

Ravio took out a handkerchief and wiped the crying blonde’s face while Glam rubbed soothing circles on Link’s back. They were pretty shocked, how come that their childhood friend, the one that was always so responsible and trustworthy could end up… doing things like this? 

The three tried their best to comfort him once he had sat down and soon enough they had calmed him down. Link tried to apologize for making the whole atmosphere really awkward and getting carried away but he was quickly shut down with “Shhh”s and hugs, as to which he smiled sadly. He hadn’t intended for this to happen… It should have just been a happy reunion. 

Link frowned internally, dang. Had he ruined it? He really hoped not. 

As if sensing his unease, Hilda started talking about the academy and their lives, he could feel she was withholding some information but he chose not to ask about it, maybe it was related to their reason of not contacting him in ever? 

Distracted as they were, they didn’t notice how the time passed until someone came to inform the other three that they needed to do something kingdom related, so they had to leave. After bidding him goodbye and a promise to continue their talk later, they left and Link didn’t know what to do.

Should he take a tour by himself? He had already been here but… one more time couldn’t hurt, right? He could also use the time to think about Rav io’s revelation. Royalty huh… That was unexpected.

A little bit after he had finished with most of the high school building, his roaming was stopped by none other than Urbosa, who stood just at the entrance of the place and was calling him. He wasn’t really sure if he had misheard her and she was calling someone with a similar name, so he didn’t walk closer at first. 

“I mean, what would she want to do with someone like me?” He was reminded of what Ravio had told him. “She’s royalty after all...”

But it seemed like it was him who she was looking for when she sighed and started walking in his direction. Had he done something wrong already? Please, it was only his first day in here!

The anguish was probably noticeable on his face as Urbosa lifted an eyebrow at him. Link half-smiled, what was he supposed to do?  
“Hey, what’s wrong? Did someone pick on you or something? You look really nervous.” 

Link vigorously shook his head, trying to find an excuse. In the end he simply said an “I’m fine.” Which made Urbosa skeptical, but she let it go.

“Anyway… Mipha’s been looking for you everywhere! When she didn’t find you, she asked for us to help her. You’re really lucky that we don’t have many things to do yet. But jeez, I finally found you!” She gestured for him to follow her as they walked out of the building.

“Really? Sorry to be such a bother...” Link looked at her smiling apologetically which Urbosa didn’t really understand. She then moved her hand to her hair while asking why the other apologized if he wasn’t at fault. Mipha wanted to see him after all, and they were just doing a favor, nothing wrong with that. “Right?” She finished with.

“Ah, yes… But I made you all waste your time looking for me when you could have been doing something more… important.” Link looked down at the floor while he said that. After all, why would royalty even bother wasting their time on him? There were probably many more things they could have been doing instead, like… whatever it was that Champions do. 

“Nah, I just told you that we didn’t have much else to do anyway.” And after a pause where the other was still looking at the floor she decided to ask. “Hey, are you sure you’re okay? You’re acting… strange. Different.” She turned a sharp eye on him when he finally looked up at her. When she didn’t get a response, she only sighed, looking at a particular table in the cafeteria. They were now in the main building.

“Link, Urbosa told us she found you! Come sit here with us!” Mipha looked away from the ongoing conversation between Daruk, Zelda and her when she saw her two friends enter. How had she told them he had found him when he never saw her use anything to communicate…? He stood there for a moment thinking about it while Urbosa sat besides the blonde, and there was a notorious space between the other two. Was it for him? No, he was just imagining things right?

“What’s wrong, little bro? Come and sit with us!” Daruk patted the space between the girl and him. So they did save a space for him? Why…? He moved almost robotically to where they wanted him to sit, giving what he hoped was somewhat like a real smile once he was there. Urbosa gave him that sharp look again while Zelda gave him a calculating one, which made him shiver… slightly.

“So…? How was it?” Mipha asked Link, who had next to no idea what she was talking about. As his confusion was pretty clear on his face, the next thing she did was to swat his arm slightly. “Our speech, idiot. You did hear it, didn’t you?” She chuckled after it, not yet noticing the inner turmoil Link felt at that moment. How was he supposed to act? What he supposed to answer in a friendly way or with respect? Why did she even want to have him here? He was just a nobody. Why hadn’t they corrected his inappropriate use of their names if they were royalty? Not even Revali had… said anything, and he sounded just like the type to brag about it to everyone. 

And most importantly, how could he get out of this one?

**Author's Note:**

> If you'd like to talk to me or give me some advise, my Tumblr's name is  Tloz4days!  
> Kudos and comments are appreciated, thank you!


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